Preamble

The House met at a Quarter before Three of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

KING'S SPEECH (ANSWER TO ADDRESS).

The VICE-CHAMBERLAIN OF THE HOUSEHOLD (Major Hennessy) reported His Majesty's Answer to the Address, as followeth:

I have received with great satisfaction the loyal and dutiful expression of your thanks for the Speech with which I have opened the present Session of Parliament.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

Bermondsey Borough Council (Street Trading) Bill,

Bolton Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Bristol Corporation Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

City of London (Various Powers) Bill,

Doncaster Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Gas Light and Coke Company Bill,

Great Western Railway Bill,

Read a Second time, and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

Guildford Corporation Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Hackney Borough Council Bill,

Hartlepool Corporation (Trolley Vehicles) Bill,

Kingston-upon-Hull Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

London and North Eastern Railway (Superannuation Fund) Bill,

London Electric and Metropolitan District Railway Companies Bill,

London, Midland and Scottish Railway Bill,

London Power Company Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Manchester Ship Canal (Superannuation) Bill,

Read a Second time, and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

Medway Conservancy Bill,

Metropolitan Electric Supply Company Bill,

Metropolitan Railway Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Middlesbrough Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Mid-Nottinghamshire Joint Railways Bill,

Read a Second time, and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

Mynyddislwyn Urban District Council Bill,

Oldham Extension Bill,

Paignton Urban District Council Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Pontefract Corporation Bill,

To be read a Second time upon Wednesday next.

Port of London Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Ramsbottom Urban District Council Bill,

Phymney Valley Water Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Southern Railway Bill,

Southern Railway (Superannuation Fund). Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Swindon Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Teignmouth and Shaldon Bridge Bill,

To be read a Second time To-morrow.

Wolverhampton Corporation Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

COMMITTEE OF SELECTION.

Mr. Charles Edwards, Sir Leolin Forestier-Walker, Colonel Gretton, Mr. Frederick Hall, Mr. Thomas Henderson, Sir Robert Hutchison, Colonel Nicholson, Sir John Pennefather, Mr. David Reid, Major Sir Granville Wheler, and Colonel Murrough Wilson nominated Members of the Committee of Selection,—[Colonel Gibbs.]

Oral Answers to Questions — LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

SECRETARIAT PREMISES.

Mr. FORREST: 1.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any and, if so, what decision has been reached in regard to the proposed sale of the League of Nations' secretariat premises?

The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Austen Chamberlain): The Secretary-General of the League was prepared to receive offers for the purchase of the site and buildings of the Secretariat up to the 15th of December last. No offer fulfilling the prescribed conditions was received up to that date, and the proposal to sell has lapsed.

EXPENSES CONTRIBUTIONS.

Sir F. HALL: 22.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the total expenditure which has been incurred by Great Britain, France and Italy, respectively, in connection with the maintenance of the League of Nations since its inception; what is the estimated annual cost of the International Court of Justice; whether any and, if so, what proportion of such cost will be borne by the United States of America; and what will be the share to be carried by this country?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The approximate totals of the contributions paid by Great Britain, France and Italy, respectively, towards the expenses of the League of Nations, since its inception, are as follows:


Great Britain
£431,888


France
£396,041


Italy
£337,736


These expenses include the cost of the International Court of Justice, which for the year 1926 is estimated at gold francs 1,907,691, or £76,300. Under the existing arrangements the proportion of this sum payable by Great Britain is approximately £8,500, but it is not possible for me to say what modification of this contribution will be made as the result of the adherence of the United States to the protocol under which the International Court of Justice was established.

Sir F. HALL: Would the right hon. Gentleman say whether the United States are going to pay a proportion of that amount?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not know, Sir.

Sir NICHOLAS GRATTAN-DOYLE: May I ask what proportion, or what sums, are to be contributed by the other members of the League?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Does The hon. Gentleman really expect I can answer that question without notice? He wants a whole series of figures relating to, I think, some 45 States.

Mr. KIRKWOOD: May I be permitted to ask the Foreign Secretary this question, arising out of the answer—seeing that we are such good contributors to the League of Nations, from a monetary point of view, and that the Foreign Secretary, our representative there, is a very powerful inditidual—through us, not, through himself—has he yet made up his mind to extend the right hand of fellowship to the Soviet of Russia to line up with us and other nations?

Mr. SPEAKER: That question does not arise out of the answer.

Oral Answers to Questions — CHINA.

ANTI-BRITISH STRIKE AND BOYCOTT.

SIR A. CHAMBERLAIN'S STATEMENT.

Mr. LOOKER: 5.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he is aware of the prohibition against all British trade in South China, which is being enforced by an organisation of the nature of a strike committee, with headquarters in Canton, and of the consequent effect upon British trade and shipping in South
China, and particularly upon the colony of Hong Kong; and if he can give the House any information as to the exact position of matters?

Mr. RAMSDEN: 6.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he is aware that the action of a section of the Chinese people in boycotting British goods is having an adverse effect on the textile and other industries of this country, and whether he will take the necessary steps to bring this boycott to an end, and enable trade to be carried on in accordance with the treaties existing between China and ourselves?

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: 13.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he can give any information as to the progress of the negotiations, official or unofficial, relating to the Shameen shootings of June last, and whether he can make any statement as to the prospect of a settlement which will have the effect of lifting the Canton boycott?

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: 16.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs the present position of the boycott of British trade from the port of Hong Kong by the provincial authorities in Canton; and what steps are being taken to bring about a removal of this boycott?

Sir CLEMENT KINLOCH-COOKE: 23.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention has been called to the position of British commercial interests in China; and can he say what steps, if any, the Government intend to take in the matter with a view to alleviating the anxiety felt by British merchants in China?

Mr. GRIFFITHS: 30.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any negotiations have taken place with the Government of Kwantung Province with a view to ending the anti-British boycott at Hong Kong; and, if so, with what result?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: His Majesty's Government are giving careful and constant attention to the serious problems arising out of the anti-British strike and boycott in South China. At the beginning of the year it seemed likely that negotiations between Hong Kong and Canton would be successful. They have,
unfortunately, broken down in a manner which must make it clear to the rest of China, and indeed to the whole world, that the Government of Canton are for the time being under influences so blindly anti-British that they are not open to reasonable settlement. The position in the rest of China is different. The policy of His Majesty's Government having been dictated by a sincere desire to promote friendly relations with the Chinese people and being inspired by sympathy with their legitimate aspirations, this attitude of patience and conciliation is bearing fruit in the slow but steady restoration of friendship and good will between the British and Chinese peoples. The trade conditions in the Yangtze Valley are now improving, and would be equally improving in North China if it were not for the civil war. There are many signs that the lawless actions directly attributable to Communist influence have disgusted all sections of Chinese people, and that they are far from approving the conduct of the extremist faction in Canton. This feeling will doubtless spread, unless intervention by a foreign Power should strengthen the extremists and unite China against the aggressor. Meanwhile, I must express my admiration for the courage and resource with which the Colony of Hong Kong and the British communities at Canton and Swatow have faced so serious a situation.
The whole question has recently been examined anew, and most carefully, by the Foreign Office, in conjunction with our representatives in China. I shall continue to give it my close attention.

Mr. LOOKER: May I ask my Right hon. Friend if the Government will consider the question of appointing a special representative to confer with the Government of Canton and the de facto Government of South China, with the object of impressing on them the necessity of putting an end to this serious situation?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: In view of what I have already said about the anti-British influence at work in Canton, I do not consider that any good purpose would be served by sending a special Commissioner to that district, and I would add that I think the sending of a special Commissioner in such circumstances could only serve to undermine the
authority of the representatives of this country in China, and that representation is in most competent hands.

Mr. LOOKER: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Pekin Government is absolutely impotent to control Canton, and would not the best method of putting an end to this situation be by this country making direct representations to them?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Everyone who is cognisant at all with the affairs of China knows, as my hon. Friend knows, that one of the greatest difficulties of the situation is the weakness of the Central Government, but I do not think the solution he proposes of sending a special commissioner to Canton is likely to remedy the weakness of the Central Government or produce any good effect in Canton.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: In view of the detaching of any legitimate grievance there may be from any anti-British sentiment would it not be desirable for the Government to consider paying compensation to the relatives of those killed in the Shanghai affair?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The offer of compensation has already been made and declined—made to the Hong Kong authorities, and declined.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: What was the offer for the death of something like 50 people?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot answer that without notice.

Mr. SOMERVILLE: Is there any relaxation of the ostracism of British firms by other foreign firms who are afraid of losing their servants if they have intercourse with British firms?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I think I should like to have notice of that question.

Mr. KIRKWOOD: Has it never dawned upon the Foreign Secretary that the troubles we are having in China are the result of the capitalists of this country going out to China to exploit the Chinese because of their cheap labour, and that the Chinese have now revolted against the conditions that we were imposing? And I would just like to ask another question of the Foreign Secretary: is
he prepared to go to war to force the Chinese to buy British goods?

Mr. SPEAKER: That is an argumentative question.

Mr. KIRKWOOD: Can I have an answer to the last part of my question.

CIVIL WAR (BRITISH SUBJECTS).

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: 3.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has any official information showing whether any British officers, ex-officers, or other British subjects have been serving with the army of Chen Chung Ming recently defeated by the Nationalist Army of Canton and, if so, whether they had permission to take part in the civil war in China: and what steps are being taken to prevent British subjects from engaging on either side of the fighting in China?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The answer to the first part of the question is in the negative. With regard to the second part, I would refer the hon. and gallant Member to Article 73 of the China Order in Council, 1925, of which I am sending him a copy.

Lieut. - Commander KENWORTHY: Is that not being strictly enforced?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Yes, Sir.

Major-General Sir ALFRED KNOX: May I ask how many subjects of the Soviet Government have been engaged in Southern China in fomenting disturbance, and will the right hon. Gentleman make representations to the Government of Moscow to secure their withdrawal?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Obviously, I have no means of obtaining that information.

CHINA INDEMNITYACT.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: 12.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the estimated cost of Lord Willingdon's mission to China; and from what funds it will be defrayed?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: An exact estimate of the cost of the mission must depend on factors such as the duration of its stay in China and the amount of travelling it will have to do while there, which cannot at present be determined. It is hoped, however, that the total cost of the mission will not exceed a sum of
£20,000. Under Section 1 (3) of the China Indemnity (Application) Act, 1925, the expenses of the mission will be defrayed from the China Indemnity Fund.

Mr. TREVELYAN: 19.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what authority will be responsible for the selection of the three Chinese members who are to form part of the statutory Committee which is to be set up under the China Indemnity (Application) Act, 1925; and whether they have yet been designated?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The Act provides that the Chinese members, like the British members, shall be appointed by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. After consultation with the British members of the Committee, with His Majesty's representatives in China, and with the Chinese Minister for Foreign Affairs, three eminent Chinese have been approached whose names will be published as soon as they have definitely accepted the appointment.

SHANGHAI DISTURBANCES.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: 14.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what action has been taken as a result of the Report of the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into the incidents of last May in Shanghai; whether such action included the tender of a cheque to the Pekin Government as an ex gratia payment to the relatives of the Chinese killed; whether that cheque has been refused; what was the ground of that refusal and whether he has any statement to make as to the possibility of terminating the ill-feeling which continues to exist in that locality?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The three Judges appointed to investigate the incident were unable to agree on a unanimous report. Their separate Reports were carefully considered by the diplomatic body at Peking; and the substance of them was communicated to the Shanghai Municipal Council. The majority of the Judges completely exonerated the police, but the Council decided, in the interests of harmonious relations with the Chinese, to accept the resignations of the Police Commissioner, as well as of the police inspector who had actually ordered the firing on 30th
May. At the same time, the Council publicly expressed their regret at the loss of life which had occurred on 30th May, and, as a mark of sympathy with the wounded and with the relatives of those killed, tendered a cheque for 75,000 dollars to the senior Consul for transmission to the local Chinese authorities, to be distributed among those concerned as a compassionate grant. This cheque was returned early in January by the local authorities under instructions from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The reason given for this action was that the Ministry, through whom the offer should have been made, had not been consulted. Documents connected with the incident and with the Judicial Commission were published in Peking on 23rd December.
Let me add that in the meanwhile I hope that the policy of patient conciliation steadily followed by His Majesty's Government is tending gradually to remove the ill-feeling caused by the incident of 30th May, and to restore goodwill between the British and Chinese peoples.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: Does the right hon. Gentleman not think, in view of the fact that the Government has had to concede in the main the recommendations of the original diplomatic inquiry, that it would be much better, and come with better grace, had we taken the advice of that inquiry earlier, instead of appointing a judicial authority to re-examine the facts?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not, Sir. I cannot regret that this matter was referred to a judicial authority, and that we had a judicial authority to substantiate our decision to make known the facts.

EXTRA-TERRITORIALITY CONFERENCE.

Mr. KELLY: 20.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he will inform the House how the matter of the Extra-Territoriality Conference at Peking now stands?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The Commission appointed under the Washington Conference Resolution to inquire into the Extra-Territorial system in China met at Peking on 12th January, and is now prosecuting its inquiries.

SEAL FISHING AREAS CONVENTION.

Major MacANDREW: 4.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affaire if any communication has been received from Japan regarding the renewal of the present quadruple pact, dealing with the seal fishing areas, which terminates next December; and whether America is prepared to negotiate with the Soviet on this question?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The Japanese Government have expressed a desire to call a conference, to meet at a place to be agreed upon, to discuss the extension and modification of the Convention. The Convention does not necessarily terminate in December next, but it may then be terminated on 12 months' written notice being given by one of the contracting parties, which notice may be given at any time subsequent to the 15th December last. Further, it is agreed in the Convention that at any time prior to the termination of the Convention, upon the request of any one of the contracting parties, a conference will be held between representatives of all the parties to consider the question of a further extension of the instrument and any modification found desirable. I have no information on the point raised in the second part of the question.

Oral Answers to Questions — TURKEY.

BRITISH WAR CLAIMS.

Mr. WARDLAW-MILNE: 2.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what steps are being taken to secure payment of their claims for War damage on the part of British traders in Turkey; and when the distribution of dividend on such claims may be expected?

The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Ronald McNeill): Claims for War damage suffered in Turkey are being dealt with by the Inter-Allied Commission appointed in accordance with the Convention of 23rd November, 1923 (Command Paper 2028). The Inter-Allied Commission have recently taken steps to accelerate their work, but I fear I cannot say when the Commission will be in a position to distribute a dividend, as this must depend on the progrese made in dealing with the large mass of claims.

Mr. WARDLAW-MILNE: Is it not the case that the Inter-Allied Commission have issued a Report on this matter, and, as a matter of fact, does not that put the possibility of payment very much nearer?

Mr. McNEILL: I think The hon. Member is mistaken.

BRITISH EMBASSY.

Captain CROOKSHANK: 21.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs when the British Embassy in Turkey is to be transferred from Constantinople to Angora?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir. I cannot add anything to the reply which I gave to The hon. Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) on 22nd December last.

Captain LODER: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability of a member of the Embassy staff being stationed at Angola?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The Ambassador himself has made frequent visits to Angora, and one of the high members of his staff is, I think, at this moment there, or about to proceed there, and at present that is as far as I am prepared to go.

Mr. PONSONBY: Is the Embassy establishment at Therapia still being maintained?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I must have notice of that question.

CHRISTIAN POPULATION.

Captain W. BENN: 25.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the number of the Christian population in the vicinity but north of the Brussels line?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I regret that I am unable to furnish the information desired by the hon. and gallant Gentleman.

Mr. NOEL BUXTON: Can the right hon. Gentleman state the approximate number of those Christians who have crossed into Iraq?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: My memory is not of the kind that enables me ever to give figures without notice, but that is a question, I may add, which would be better addressed to the Colonial Secretary, as the Minister responsible for Iraq.
Within Iraq, where we are the mandatory authority, we may have the figures, or be able to get them—I think we have them—but as to Turkish territory, I have not got the figures, and cannot get them.

Captain BENN: Would it be right to assume that there is any considerable number of Christians immediately on the Turkish side of the border?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: There certainly were. I do not know what it is proper to assume at this time.

Oral Answers to Questions — RUSSIA (OUTSTANDING QUESTIONS).

Mr. BR IANT: 7.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if his attention has been drawn to the negotiations proceeding between the French and Soviet Governments with a view to the settlement of debts and other outstanding questions; and if he will take steps to initiate similar negotiations between His Majesty's Government and the Soviet Government?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The French Government have informed me that they are about to begin negotiations with the Soviet Government for the settlement of outstanding questions. I shall watch the course of these negotiations with interest in the hope that it may be of a nature to facilitate the renewal of conversations with His Majesty's Government.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: In view of the recent successful negotiations with the Royal Italian Government, cannot the right hon. Gentleman reconsider opening up negotiations with the Soviet Government?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I do not see how that question arises out of the question on the Paper, or the answer which I have given to it.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS.

The following questions stood on the Order Paper in the name of Lieut.-Colonel Sir FREDERICK HALL:

8. To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he has received evidence that the Soviet Government in China and elsewhere are not observing the terms of the trading agreement with Great Britain, by which they undertake
not to carry on, or support in any way, anti-British propaganda; and if he will state whether it is proposed to put an end to the agreement?

9. To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether it is proposed that the economic and disarmament conferences to be convened under the auspices of the League of Nations shall be held outside Switzerland; and, if so, will he state what is the reason for this, seeing that such a course would entail additional expenditure, compared with the holding of the conferences in Switzerland, where buildings and other facilities have been provided at a heavy cost?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend as regards both questions to the replies circulated among the Written Answers on Thursday, 4th February. If he wishes for further information in either case, perhaps he will put another question down on the Order Paper.

Sir F. HALL: I was not aware; I took them off yesterday, and put them down for to-day. I was unaware that the answers had been circulated. I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman.

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Unless I receive notice that a question has been withdrawn, I naturally hand in the answer in the ordinary course, and that answer is automatically printed.

Sir F. HALL: Just to clear myself on this paint, I want to inform my Right hon. Friend that I gave a notification at the Table. Therefore, I am sure my Right hon. Friend will exonerate me from any desire to do what I should not do.

Oral Answers to Questions — FRENCH RENTS BILL.

Sir WALTER de FRECE: 10.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any representations have been made by the French Government in regard to the new French Rents Bill: and, if so, with what result?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: His Majesty's Ambassador in Paris is being instructed to claim for British subjects in France national treatment as regards the benefits which are granted to French citizens by the new French Rent Bill from which certain classes of foreigners are excluded.

Oral Answers to Questions — FOREIGNERS (OWNERSHIP OF LAND).

Sir W. de FRECE: 11.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in how many countries foreigners are forbidden to own land or exploit natural properties unless they become naturalised?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: In the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics foreigners cannot own land, but may exploit natural properties under license from the Soviet Government.
In Mexico foreigners may be granted the right to acquire ownership in lands and waters, or to obtain mining concessions, provided that they agree to be regarded as Mexicans in respect of such property.
In the Republic of Colombia foreigners interested in the exploitation of hydrocarbons "must submit themselves to the provisions of the laws relating to aliens and naturalisation."
My hon. Friend will find valuable information as to the practice of other countries in a paper "Holding of Real Estate by Aliens in Foreign Countries" published by His Majesty's Stationery Office in 1922, of which I am sending him copy.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMANY.

ALLIED TROOPS (OCCUPIED AREAS).

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: 15.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether agreement has been reached for the reduction of the numbers of the Allied troops in the occupied areas of Germany; and when a reduction may be expected?

Mr. PONSONBY: 35.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the present size of the armies of occupation in the Rhineland; to what figure are they to be reduced; and what will be the proportion of British, French and Belgian troops, respectively?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I will answer these questions together. The numbers of the armies of occupation are actually 74,500, or very close to that figure, but it is not the case, as stated in some newspapers a little time ago, that the Governments of the occupying Powers had decided to fix at or about this figure the total of the effectives in the second
and third zones. In the note of the Conference of Ambassadors of the 14th November it was stated that the effectives would be considerably reduced, and that the reduction would be to a figure approaching the normal. This remains the policy of the occupying Powers, who are giving their attention to the various problems involved in it, with a view to giving effect to it by an appreciable reduction of the actual numbers when the Treaties of Locarno are ratified and the measures of amelioration already introduced into the régime of occupation have had their natural pacifying effect on the situation in the occupied territory.

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY: I am sorry to press the right hon. Gentleman, but can I have an answer to the second part of my question—can he state when this reduction will begin?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I cannot more exactly define the time than I have already done in the insw er which I have just read.

Mr. PONSONBY: Would the right hon. Gentleman answer the last part of my question—as to the proportion of the troops?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I am very sorry that I overlooked that, and I am afraid I have not the figures with me, but roughly there are 60,00 French, 8,000 British, and the remainder Belgian.

CIVIL FLYING.

Captain BENN: 24.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any progress has been made in the negotiations as to the righ; of civil flying over German territory?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The German Government have agreed to continue the present system up to 31st March. What is to happen after that date is under consideration.

Captain BENN: Will negotiations as to the air clauses of the Treaty continue to be carried on by the Conference of Ambassadors, or will it pass under the competence of the League of Nations?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I think that, until they have been carried further than at present, they cannot possibly pass to the League of Nations.

Oral Answers to Questions — FIGHTING SERVICES (FRANCE AND ITALY).

Mr. GILLETT: 17.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will state what is the total amount in each of the three last years spent by France and Italy, respectively, on their Army, Navy, and Air Force; and what percentage of the total national expenditure does it represent?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: As the details asked for by the hon. Member involve many figures, I will, with his permission, circulate them in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following are the details:

The information desired by the hon. Member is given in the following table:—


France:



1923:
Frs.


Total Services (Army, Navy and Air)
5,550,302,158


Total national Expenditure
41,701,000,000


Percentage 13.3


1924:



Total Services
5,143,640,722


Total national Expenditure
41,887,000,000


Percentage 12.3.


1925:



Total Services
5,596,627,694


Total national Expenditure
33,136,000,000


Percentage 16.9


Italy:



1923:
Millions of lire.


Total Services (Army, Navy and Air)
3,558


Total national expenditure
24,779


Percentage 14.3


1924:



Total Services
3,274


Total national expenditure
22,399


Percentage 14.6


1925:



Total Services
3,100


Total national expenditure
18,819


Percentage 16.5

Mr. GILLETT: 18.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what are the figures for the last three years of the number of men and machines in the French and Italian Air Forces?

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for AIR (Major Sir Philip Sassoon): I have been asked to reply. So far as I am aware the French and Italian Governments have not recently published exact statistics as to the strength of their respective Air Forces, but according to my information the first line strength of the French Air Services at the present time is approximately 1,300 machines, whilst the corresponding figure for the Italian Air Force is 600 machines. There has been little change in these figures during the past three years, but the French figure represents a small increase as compared with 1924, whilst the Italian Air Force is in the early stages of a considerable programme of expansion. As regards personnel it is not practicable to give figures since a large number of those employed on air duties are found from the Navy and Army, both in France and in Italy.

Captain BENN: Is the expansion of the French Air Force in accordance with the anticipations of the Government of last year when our own Air Force was expanded?

Sir P. SASSOON: The increase since 1924 is only a small increase, and I think it is entirely in accord with what we anticipated.

Oral Answers to Questions — BULGARIA (LOAN).

Mr. BECKETT: 26.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether any approaches have been made to this country by the new Bulgarian Government with regard to a loan?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir.

Oral Answers to Questions — FOREIGN OFFICE (MR. G. A. MOUNSEY).

Mr. BECKETT: 27.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to what position Mr. G. A. Mounsey has been appointed in the Foreign Office; what is the reason for his appointment; and is any change of policy indicated?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: Mr. Mounsey has been appointed to be head of the Far Eastern Department of the Foreign Office, his predecessor being about to be promoted to a post abroad. No change of policy is involved in an appointment of this nature.

Oral Answers to Questions — PASSPORTS AND VISAS.

Sir HARRY BRITTAIN: 28.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, following results already effected in this direction, his Department is negotiating with further foreign countries for the mutual elimination of the visa; and, if so, with which countries are these negotiations being carried out?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir; no negotiations of this nature are in progress.

Sir H. BRITTAIN: Why not?

29. The hon. Member further asked whether, following the Treaty of Locarno, the Secretary of State san see his way to recommend to the Council of the League of Nations that the rules and regulations governing the war-time measure of passports and visa be re-examined by all nations ooncerned, with a view to facilitating international intercourse?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: The League of Nations have already issued invitations to all Governments to be represented at a Conference on Communications and Transit to be held at Geneva in May next, at which passport and visa questions will be discussed.

Oral Answers to Questions — SUDAN PLANTATION SYNDICATE.

Mr. SCURR: 31.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether there is any agreement, obligation, or understanding whereby the Sudan Government is obliged to see that the Sudan Plantation Syndicate is supplied with native labour?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: No, Sir.

Mr. ALBERY: Will the Foreign Secretary draw the attention of his colleagues and of the Minister of Labour to the excellent results obtained by the system of profit-sharing in this great industry?

Mr. SPEAKER: That is hardly a kind of supplementary question which is relevant.

Oral Answers to Questions — LOCARNO TREATY.

Captain GARRO-JONES: 32.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
what progress is being made in implementing the provisions of the Treaty of Locarno?

Sir A. CHAMBERLAIN: I am in communication with the other signatories of the Treaty of Locarno with a view to fixing an early date for the deposit of the ratifications with the League of Nations.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL NAVY.

DOVER HARBOUR (WESTERN ENTRANCE).

Major GLYN: 37.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether the two block ships sunk at the western entrance of Dover harbour during the War are to be removed in order to enable vessels, under all conditions, to enter the harbour with safety; whether a promise was made when the ships were sunk that on the conclusion of hostilities they would be removed; and what has been the reason for allowing this danger to shipping to remain until now?

The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Bridgeman): The naval harbour at Dover, including the two ships sunk adjoining the western entrance, was transferred by the Dover Harbour Act, 1923, to the local Harbour Board. These ships are considered to be more of an assistance to navigation than a danger, and no suggestion that their removal is advisable has been received from the Dover Harbour Board. No promise was made that these ships would be removed at the conclusion of hostilities.

Major GLYN: If representations are made with regard to the danger to navigation, will the Admiralty assist in removing those ships?

Mr. BRIDGEMAN: I should like to consider any suggestions of that kind which my hon. and gallant Friend has to make.

Vice-Admiral Sir REGINALD HALL: Is not the question of filling up the gap by the Dover Harbour Board now under discussion?

Mr. BRIDGEMAN: First of all, it is a matter for the Dover Harbour Board, and until they make representations to us, I do not think I can take any action.

STEAMSHIP "LAURENTIC" (GOLD SALVAGE).

Major GLYN: 38.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty how much gold was recovered from the wreck of the "Laurentic" through the agency of Admiralty divers; what was the total period occupied in these operations and at what cost; and what payment was made to the officers and men concerned other than their ordinary pay for having carried out this task without loss of life or material?

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the ADMIRALTY (Mr. Davidson): The total value of the gold recovered was £4,958,708 13s. 9d. The operations were carried out during the spring and summer months of the years 1917 and 1919 to 1924, and cost approximately £128,000, including a bonus to the officers and men concerned. The total amount of the bonus, which was paid in addition to ordinary pay, extra pay for diving, etc., was £6,739 3s. 4d.

ROSYTH AND PEMBROKE DOCKYARDS.

Mr. KELLY: 39.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty what steps have been taken to secure work other than armament work for the shops and yards at Rosyth and Pembroke in order to make use of the machinery and plant in those places, and so prevent the men and women now in the service of the Admiralty being thrown out of work?

Mr. N. MACLEAN: 43.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether any scheme was submitted to him for utilisation on other work of the dockyards proposed to be closed; if so, whether he can state the nature of the scheme or schemes considered, and the reason why it was not accepted; and, if no scheme has been considered, whether he will suspend the closing of those yards until every avenue of alternate use has been explored?

Mr. DAVIDSON: The Admiralty are willing to consider suitable proposals for the use of the two yards for private enterprise. The conditions on which Pembroke Yard can be leased were given in reply to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pembroke on 4th February, and similar conditions for Rosyth Dockyard will be arranged if any substantial proposals for its use are received. I may
add that no proposals for utilising either of the two yards have been declined by the Admiralty.

Mr. KELLY: Will the hon. Gentleman reply to my question as to whether any steps have been taken to provide work for these yards?

Mr. DAVIDSON: I think that is answered by the reply I have given. We are willing to assist private enterprise which is willing to use the yards.

Mr. KELLY: I have not asked about private enterprise, but I asked if the Admiralty took any steps to find work for this valuable machinery and plant to be engaged upon work other than armament work.

Mr. DAVIDSON: No, Sir.

Mr. BECKETT: Can the right hon. Gentleman say why, if public enterprise is the best thing to provide battleships, it is a bad thing to provide other things?

HIS MAJESTY'S SHIP "HAMPSHIRE."

Sir ROBERT HAMILTON: 40.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he is aware that the small boat in which the late Lord Kitchener and the late Colonel Fitzgerald left the "Hampshire" on 5th June, 1916, has been purchased by a private individual; and whether this boat can be acquired by the Admiralty as a national relic?

Mr. BRIDGEMAN: I should be obliged if The hon. and gallant Member would repeat his question in a week's time, when I hope the inquiries I am making will be completed.

Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is this a part of the Government's economy scheme?

Mr. BRIDGEMAN: I have not given any answer as to what the Government propose to do.

CHIEF COOK J. YOUNG.

Major Sir BERTRAM FALLE: 42.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he will inquire into the case of Chief Cook J. Young, who served 23 years' continuous service, including the War, and was discharged to shore without pension on the grounds that he was an alien, his place of birth having been put down by the recruiting officer as Mobile, United States of America, while J. Young claims he was born in Nassau, Bahamas?

Mr. DAVIDSON: I note that James Young now claims to have been born at Nassau, Bahamas. According to his declaration on entry into the Naval Service he was born in Alabama, U.S.A. He later submitted a sworn statement that he was born near Montreal, Canada, but was a subject of the United States of America and the son of subjects of the United States.
I may add that as far back as 1904 the Board of Admiralty decided that he could only reckon time for pension provided he became naturalised. In connection with his present claim to pension he has been invited to prove that he was born in British Dominions but he has not submitted such evidence.

Sir B. FALLE: Was this man informed that he would have to be naturalised in 1904?

Mr. DAVIDSON: I cannot say.

Sir B. FALLE: Does the hon. Gentleman not think that it is rather late, after a long service of 23 years, and all through the War, that a man should be refused a pension.

Mr. DAVIDSON: This man must have known in 1904 that, unless he was a British subject, he could not have a pension.

Mr. MAXTON: Having regard to the very arduous and important duties that this particular man has performed, could the hon. Gentleman not give consideration to this as a special case?

Mr. DAVIDSON: We have asked him to prove his British birth.

Mr. SPENCER: How can he, if he cannot?

INTERPORT WELFARE CONFERENCE.

Sir B. FALLE: 44.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty whether the Interport Naval Welfare Conference will be held at Plymouth this year; and, if so, when an announcement can be expected?

Mr. DAVIDSON: The Welfare Conferences will be held this year, and the Central Port meetings will take place at Plymouth. The orders will probably be issued within the next few weeks.

DISABILITY PENSION APPEALS.

Sir B. FALLE: 54.
asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty the total number of naval ratings invalided between the 1st January, 1925, and 31st December, 1925.; the number whose disability was considered by the surveying boards to be not attributable to service; the number of men whose disability was not considered to be due to service, and who have questioned this decision and appealed to the Admiralty; and the percentage of these appellants who have derived benefit from such appeal?

Mr. DAVIDSON: The total number of naval ratings invalided between 1st January, 1925, and 31st December, 1925, was 1,474, and the number whose disability was considered by the surveying boards to be not attributable to the service was 1,397. I regret that particulars as to the number of men who appeal are not recorded.

Oral Answers to Questions — IMPORT TARIFFS (DUMPING).

Sir FREDRIC WISE: 46.
asked the Prime Minister if he will introduce in the present Session legislation so that the imposition of any duties should have immediate effect and prevent dumping in the interval?

The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Baldwin): When the time comes it will be found that we have not overlooked this important matter.

Mr. REMER: Has the Prime Minister's attention been called to the serious damage to industry caused through the dumping of silk goods before the Silk Duties were imposed, and the serious unemployment which has been caused thereby?

Captain BENN: Does the Prime Minister mean that the policy of the Government is to impose tariffs retrospectively?

The PRIME MINISTER: I mean nothing but what I say in the answer.

Oral Answers to Questions — COMMITTEE OF IMPERIAL DEFENCE.

Mr. THURTLE: 48.
asked the Prime Minister who constitute the permanent members of the Committee of Imperial Lefence?

The PRIME MINISTER: I would refer The hon. Member to pages 24 and 25 of the Report of the Sub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence on National and Imperial Defence published in 1924 (Cmd. 2029). In addition to the members therein indicated I have invited my Noble Friend the Lord Privy Seal to join the Committee.

Mr. THURTLE: May we assume from the answer that it is safe to say that there are permanent members of the Committee of Imperial Defence?

The PRIME MINISTER: I should like notice of that, because I want to be very particular in giving an answer. My impression is that the answer is, "No." I think it is within the competence of the Prime Minister when the Government takes office.

Mr. W. THORNE: May I ask whether the Committee in question have any executive powers?

The PRIME MINISTER: I should like to have notice of that question.

Mr. THURTLE: 49.
asked the Prime Minister if the Committee of Imperial Defence has met to consider the effect of the Locarno Treaty upon the defence problems of this country; and, if so, will he state what conclusions were arrived at by the Committee?

The PRIME MINISTER: The effects on our defence problems of the policy culminating in the conclusion of the Locarno Treaty were considered by the Committee of Imperial Defence at every stage. The Committee's conclusions were entirely favourable to the conclusion of the Treaty.

Oral Answers to Questions — FRANCHISE.

Miss WILKINSON: 50.
asked the Prime Minister whether he can yet give any information as to when the Government intends to introduce a Bill giving equal franchise to men and women, or whether he proposes a conference on the matter; and, if so, whether such conference is likely to meet during the present Session?

The PRIME MINISTER: As I have already said, I can make no statement on this subject at present.

Miss WILKINSON: May we take it that the Prime Minister is bearing in mind the definite pledges he gave to the women of the country that legislation would be introduced during this Parliament?

The PRIME MINISTER: Yes, but we are still young.

Mr. PETHICK-LAWRENCE: Can the Prime Minister give us any indication as to whether it would be any use putting down this question again before Easter?

The PRIME MINISTER: I have never any objection to questions being put down, but I do not think a definite answer can be expected in the immediate future.

Oral Answers to Questions — POISON GAS.

Mr. CECIL WILSON: 51.
asked the Prime Minister what progress the Committee of Imperial Defence has made since July last in regard to measures to be taken for the protection of the civil population against poison gas, and whether he can state if and when any announcement will be made on the subject?

The PRIME MINISTER: The measures to which the hon. Member refers are still under consideration as part of the general problem of the protection of the civil population against air attack. It will be appreciated that it is not in the public interest for me to say anything more specific on this subject.

Mr. SEXTON: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Secretary of State for War was so extremely anxious to protect people from poison gas that he has actually gone the length of getting an order of the Court to eject a colony of people, thereby giving them the alternative of being poisoned or of freezing to death?

Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member told us that three months ago

Oral Answers to Questions — PUBLIC SOCIAL SERVICES (OVERLAPPING).

Sir JOHN MARRIOTT: 52.
asked the Prime Minister if he is prepared to advise His Majesty the King to appoint a Royal
Commission to inquire into the overlapping of public social services, and to make recommendations as to the appropriate remedy?

The PRIME MINISTER: An inquiry, very much on the lines of that now suggested, was made in 1923 by a Committee, under the Chairmanship of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour, the Committee's Report being published as Command Paper 2011. Judging from the Report, there would not appear to be sufficient ground for undertaking a more extensive inquiry at the present time, though I agree that the question of overlapping should be carefully watched.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION (COMMITTEES).

Captain GARRO-JONES: 53.
asked the Prime Minister whether he intends to set up a Committee to deal with questions affecting education,

The PRIME MINISTER: No, Sir. There already exists a statutory Consultative Committee to advise the Board of Education upon any matters referred to it; teachers' salaries are dealt with by the Standing Joint Committees, presided over by Lord Burnham, and there are Standing Committees considering questions relating to adult education, juvenile organisations, and matters of common interest to the Board and to the Ministry of Agriculture. In addition, there are at present sitting, as The hon. and gallant Member is doubtless aware, a number of Committees, which have been specially set up to advise upon certain specific questions relating to education.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNEMPLOYMENT.

IRON AND STEEL INDUSTRY.

Mr. REMER: 56.
asked the Minister of Labour how many persons are unemployed in the steel industry of the United Kingdom?

The MINISTER of LABOUR (Sir Arthur Steel-Maitland): The number of insured persons recorded as unemployed in Great Britain on 25th January, classified as belonging to the industrial group "steel melting and iron puddling furnaces, iron and steel rolling mills and forges," was 44,137.

Mr. GRIFFITHS: Is the Minister aware that, although he finds so many unemployed in the iron and steel trade, the production is greater to-day than it was in 1913?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Yes, Sir, I am quite well aware of the capacity of the industry.

Mr. ERSKINE: Does the answer mean that there are 44,000 victims of Free Trade?

RELIEF WORK.

Mr. TREVELYA'N THOMSON: 51.
asked the Minister of Labour the amount of relief work at present in course of construction under schemes sanctioned by the Unemployment Grants Committee; and the amount of grants towards the same, and similar figures, for a year ago?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I regret that information precisely in the form asked for in this question is not available. The number of men employed on schemes assisted through the Unemployment Grants Committee was 33,280 on 31st December, 1925, as compared with 38,605 a year previously. The gross estimated cost of schemes sanctioned during the four months 1st October to 31st January was £7,250,000 in 1925–6, as compared with £4,269,000 in 1924–5.

Mr. THOMSON: Arising out of those reduced figures, may I ask the Minister if he will authorise the Unemployment Grants Committee to make grants not less than those of last year in those districts where unemployment has increased.

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I do not think that this question can really be dealt with, if I may say so, in the form of question and answer. There is a Supplementary Estimate coming on, on which I imagine it could be raised, but, broadly speaking, the position is that the Unemployment Grants Committee can consider two cases namely, where the application is a definite anticipation of work for the future, and also where unemployment is excessive.

EXTENDED BENEFIT (REGULATIONS).

Mr. T. THOMSON: 58.
asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that the recent Regulations governing the administration of extended benefit have
operated so as to throw a large number of the unemployed on to Poor Law relief and thus increased the local rates; and can he see his way to modify these Regulations in view of the already heavy burden of local rates?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I presume the hon. Member refers to the rules made under Section 1 of the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1925. I am not aware that these rules have resulted in throwing a large number of persons on to the Poor Law, and I do not see how that could happen, since cases of hardship are expressly excluded from the operation of the rules.

Mr. T. WILLIAMS: Is not the right hon. Gentleman aware that, for the quarter ending in September, as compared with the quarter ending in March, the amount paid to unemployed persons by way of Poor Law relief increased by well over £100,000?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am quite well aware of the increase in the amount spent on Poor Law relief, and, as a matter of fact, I am at this moment trying to analyse the causes, in order to get as near accuracy as I can as to the different reasons which probably contribute. I have only said in my answer that I do not think the Regulations about which the hon. Member asks have in themselves much bearing on the matter. It is due, I think, principally to other causes, but I do not like to say anything about it until the inquiries we are making at, this moment are complete.

Mr. LANSBURY: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in one district alone in East London the effect of these Regulations has been to put £2,000 a week on to the expenditure of one board of guardians?

Mr. R. RICHARDSON: Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been called to a statement made by the chairman of the board of guardians of Sunderland, in which he said that the action of the Ministry will make their Poor Rate five times as much as it was before?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I cannot call to mind that particular statement; if the hon. Member will give me the figures for any particular case, I will gladly go into them. I do not want to
mislead hon. Members opposite, and, therefore, I would ask them just to concentrate upon what the question really was. It was with regard to the rules made under my discretion, and my answer only referred to those rules. As regards those rules, I feel fairly clear in my own mind; I do not think that those rules and regulations have had a great deal to do with the matter.

Mr. THOMAS SHAW: Will the Minister, in attempting to analyse these figures, carefully pay attention to the fact that when these Regulations were abolished Poor Law relief went down, and when they were re-introduced it went up?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am perfectly well aware of the statement that my right hon. Friend has made, and, if he will inquire into it, he will find that, while there was quite undoubtedly a fall in the amount of Poor Law relief owing to the changes in 1924, it is far more probable that that was due to the actual amount of the relief given per head, which has not been changed. Anyone who is really conversant with this very difficult question knows that a change of a, shilling or two in the amount of the rate causes a transference from unemployment benefit to Poor Law relief, and vice versa. It is difficult to deal with the matter by supplementary questions; it is really a matter for a Debate.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. SPEAKER: I think it would be better to deal with this matter in Debate.

Mr. BUCHANAN: May I ask you a question, Sir? Would it be in order, seeing the urgency of this question, for any Member to move the Adjournment of the House upon it, seeing that it is a question of very urgent public importance?

Mr. SPEAKER: This is a matter which, unfortunately, has been before the House for three years at least.

TRAINING CENTRES.

Mr. GADOGAN: 59.
asked the Minister of Labour whether the six months course of training for young unemployed men at Claydon and other centres has so far proved a success; what is the number of candidates selected for the course; how
many applications have been received; and whether he intends to increase the number of such training centres?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I am glad to be able to say that excellent progress is being made with the training of young unemployed men at the training centres. The total number of men selected as suitable for training is 2,013, and the number of applications received exceeds 5,000. The scheme is in the nature of an experiment, and, at present, it is not proposed to increase the number of centres.

Mr. CADOGAN: Can the right hon. Gentleman say by what process candidates are selected for these courses?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: Applications are made, and the cases are reviewed by officials of the Exchanges; and, in the case of residential centres where training is given for possible work overseas, the cases are again examined by the Dominion authorities, in order to make quite sure that they will be allowed to go there, before they go to the centres for training.

Sir C. KINLOCH-COOKE: Can the Minister say how many of these young men have been found work after their training?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: The training as yet has only proceeded for half its time, but in regard to Birmingham, I may say—I am speaking from memory, and, therefore, my figures may not be exact—that, roughly speaking, out of about 400 in the Birmingham training centre, although the training was originally intended to be for six months, about 150 have found work already.

Oral Answers to Questions — SHIPS' WIRELESS OPERATORS (WAGES DISPUTE).

Mr. GRIFFITHS: 61.
asked the Minister of Labour if he will state the fundamental difference or differences between the functions, adequacy and powers of a special court of inquiry and the industrial court; and whether, as a special court of inquiry would serve a better purpose in the interests of the nation in regard to the marine wireless dispute, he will reconsider this matter?

Lord APSLEY: 55.
asked the Minister of Labour whether an industrial court of inquiry will be granted to inquire into the shipowners' and wireless operators' dispute?

Mr. CONNOLLY: 66.
asked the Minister of Labour whether, seeing that he has been requested by the Association of Wireless and Cable Telegraphists on three separate occasions to set up a court of inquiry into the facts of the marine wireless dispute, and has thrice refused to do so, and seeing that he has powers under the Statute to set up such a court of inquiry at the request of one or either party concerned, or at his own discretion whether requested by one or either party or not, he will state on what grounds he still refuses to set up such court?

Mr. HAYES: 94.
asked the Minister of Labour whether, seeing that no sort or kind of negotiations are at the moment taking place between the parties to the marine wireless dispute, that no meeting between them has taken place since 22nd December, that the employers were to have been at the Ministry of Labour on 3rd February to meet the employes and failed to present themselves, and that his Department have failed to bring the parties together, he will say what steps he proposes to take?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: In this dispute and in others the main object of the Department is to assist the parties to find terms upon which the dispute can be settled. If the parties cannot themselves arrive at a settlement of the questions in dispute, but are willing to allow an impartial tribunal to decide between them, the Industrial Court is in a position to make a definite award. A Court of Inquiry, which may be appointed without the consent of either party, is not in a position to give a decision binding upon the parties. Negotiations have in fact been proceeding up to the present, and the Ministry of Labour has arranged a meeting with the two parties at the Ministry this afternoon. I do not propose to take any further action until I know the result of that meeting.

Mr. GRIFFITHS: 60.
asked the Minister of Labour whether, in view of the fact that the employment of wireless operators on board ships is the subject of competition between the various wireless com- 
panies and the shipowners, he will take steps to regularise such employment in the interests of this national service?

Mr. BASIL PETO: 86.
asked the Minister of Labour whether he can give the House any information as to the arbitration in the wireless operators' dispute; and whether he proposes to take any steps to alter the present arrangements whereby the services of these wireless operators are farmed out to the shipowners and to arrange that they shall be paid direct under agreement with the shipping companies whom they serve?

Mr. T. KENNEDY: 93.
asked the Minister of Labour whether the marine wireless operators, through their representatives, have now agreed to submit all points at issue in the marine wireless dispute to a court of arbitration; whether he has conveyed this to the employers; whether the employers have agreed; and, if not, what steps he proposes to take to bring about a settlement?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I have no power to lay down the conditions of employment in the wireless service, but the terms of settlement offered by the wireless companies, in conjunction with the shipowners, include the discussion with the men's representatives of more uniform and mutually satisfactory conditions of service, including wages. They proposed that if agreement is not reached by a date to be fixed, any question at issue shall be referred to the Industrial Court for settlement. This offer provides an opportunity for all the parties concerned to agree upon a more stable and satisfactory basis of employment. The Association of Wireless and Cable Telegraphists have since also proposed arbitration, but only on certain points other than wages, which were under discussion when the dispute began. I understand that these points could all be raised on the basis of arbitration, proposed by the employers.

Mr. GRIFFITHS: The right hon. Gentleman has just said they are meeting this afternoon. Suppose they fail to agree, what steps does he propose to take?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I have already said that proposals for arbitra-
tion have been made on both sides beforehand, but not what I should call complete proposals. The proposals of the men are not proposals for general arbitration on all the points. I hope they may come to an agreement this afternoon. I cannot say they will do so. Do not let anyone think it is certain they will do so. But I am trying the whole time to get them to come to an agreement on the matter and I only hope they may. Of course, it is open to Members of the House after to-day to ask me what the issue has been, but I trust hon. Members will let me say this, that as far as one can see no obstacle is put on any side to the two sides meeting together.

Mr. GRIFFITHS: I can see that some shipowners are restive on the other side. Is the Minister aware that a non-party meeting of all the Members of this House was held in one of the rooms last week and that the men there by their representatives agreed to submit all points to arbitration?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I take it from the hon. Member and some other hon. Members who were present at that meeting that that is what was understood, but I find it very difficult answering in detail questions on the dispute because, as hon. Members on all sides know, it is difficult to carry in one's mind the precise terms of letters which have been exchanged and of which one has seen copies, and I do not wish to make a slip which may cause further trouble in the dispute. Subject to that, I would say that from my remembrance of the copy of the letter I saw from the wireless telegraphists, it did not contain a complete offer of arbitration on all points.

Major-General Sir NEWTON MOORE: On a point of Order. May I call attention to the fact that the answer is of such length that it will preclude other Members from putting questions.

Mr. SPEAKER: As the House is aware that the parties are meeting this afternoon, it would be wise to let the matter rest for the moment.

Mr. T. KENNEDY: Have the shipowners, in agreeing to arbitration, given any indication that they are prepared to submit to arbitration the cause of the dispute—the reduction in wages?

Sir A. STEEL-MAITLAND: I do not think the wages question will be excluded from the whole consideration or reconsideration under the shipowners' offer.

Lieut.- Commander KENWORTHY: With regard to the point of Order raised by the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Richmond (Sir N. Moore), may I put it to you, Sir, that it is to be encouraged that Ministers should give information?

Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Gentleman often gives us information under cover of a question.

Mr. KIRKWOOD: It is all very well for you, Sir, to say that, but it is the only means we have here, and I am astonished at you.

Oral Answers to Questions — COAL MINING INDUSTRY (ROYAL COMMISSION REPORT).

Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: (by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister whether he can state when the Report of the Royal Commission on the Coal Industry will be in the hands of the Government, and when it, will be published.

The PRIME MINISTER: I understand that the Royal Commission hope to present their Report at the end of February, or shortly afterwards. As soon as it is received arrangements will immediately be made for its publication.

Mr. SPENCER: By what means are some of the London papers supposed to get hold of the conclusions of the Commissioners before they have been stated to this House? The "Express" printed yesterday what they stated to be the findings of the Commission before ever they had been submitted to the House.

The PRIME MINISTER: I am seldom at a loss for an answer, but that is a question I cannot answer.

Mr. T. WILLIAMS: In view of the universal interest in this very great problem, will the Prime Minister deprecate any sort of interim report that may appear, inspired or otherwise, in any newspaper?

Mr. J. JONES: Has not the Prime Minister or the Government power to summon the proprietors of these news-
papers to the Bar of the House for publishing statements absolutely devoid of truth?

Mr. MacDONALD: Perhaps it would be convenient for the Prime Minister if I put the question in this form: In view of the publication of what appears to be definite details of that Report in the newspapers yesterday, and I believe before, is it or is it not a fact that any communication has been made conveying these details to the Government themselves?

The PRIME MINISTER: No; I have had no communication of any kind. I need hardly say how I deprecate any report of that kind. Nothing could do more harm.

Oral Answers to Questions — BALLOT FOR NOTICES OF MOTION.

UNEMPLOYMENT.

Sir A. SHIRLEY BENN: I beg to give notice that, on this day two weeks, I will draw attention to where remunerative employment might be found for some of the unemployed, and move a Resolution.

DOMINIONS AND EMPIRE POLICY (CO-ORDINATION).

Lord SANDON: I beg to give notice that, on this day two weeks, I will call attention to the need of co-ordination in Dominions and Empire policy, and move a Resolution.

NECESSITOUS AREAS.

Mr. LAWSON: I beg to give notice that, on this day two weeks, I will call attention to the position in necessitous areas, and move a Resolution.

FOOD SUPPLY.

Mr. G. HALL: I beg to give notice that, on this day two weeks, I will call attention to the food supply, and move a Resolution.

LEASEHOLD ENFRANCHISEMENT.

Major MALONE: I beg to move,
That leave be given:o introduce a Bill to enable leaseholders of houscis whose original leases were granted for a term of not less than 30 years to purchase the freehold estate and such other outstanding interests affecting the property on such equitable terms as, failing agreement, may be determined by the Minister of Health for the time being.
The question of leasehold enfranchisement is not a new thing in this House. In 1923, the House granted me leave to bring in a Bill dealing with this question but, unfortunately, the Government took all the time of the House and it was not possible to proceed further with the Measure. I hope that on this occasion I shall be more successful, as we have a more sympathetic Government in power.
The system of leasehold has been condemned all over the country. Hundreds and thousands of people are writing letters condemning the system, and many cases are brought to our notice demonstrating its injustice. I will explain briefly how the present system works. On an acre of ground 30 houses can be erected, I will, however, base my figures on the erection of 27 houses to the acre, which has been done in my own district. The ground rent of each house is £6 per annum, amounting to £162, whereas the ordinary value of that land would be, at the outside, £4 per annum. Ground rents are not subject to any local taxation. When houses are built upon that acre of land the ground rents bring in to the ground landlord £162. The system is not fair and equitable. The ground landlord does not contribute one penny to local taxation. He does not contribute to the making of the roads, lighting, sewerage, or any of the costs of the locality. Although he draws his money from ground rents, he has no interest whatever in the local authority, and in bearing a share of the burden of the upkeep of the district. The leaseholder has to bear his share of all the expenses of the district.
No improvements can be made without the assent of the ground landlord, and usually that assent is not given unless a fine and increased rent are imposed. I will give a concrete case, where the end of the lease was approaching. The rent of the premises was £60. The leaseholder asked for a renewal, but he could only get a renewal on terms which included the increase of the rent to £120 and the payment down of a lump sum of £200. There are many cases which we read of in the newspapers where a man's good will, etc., is sold without the man getting a chance to buy. When the lease is approaching expiration, the leaseholder is faced with a bill for dilapidations, and very often he has practically to rebuild the premises, and then has to hand them
over in a tenantable condition to the ground landlord. There are many instances of "sharks" buying up short leases, and then sending in a high bill, which compels the leaseholder to relinquish even 10 or 20 years.
The question of leasehold enfranchisement has been raised all over the country, and is crying out for redress. I have not brought forward this Bill to-day because of the manifesto of the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George). In 1923 I introduced a similar Measure. I hope that on this occasion I shall get more support from the opposite side of the House. I trust that the House will not only grant me leave to bring in the Bill, but that they will press upon the Government the necessity of carrying the Bill into law.

Mr. DENNIS HERBERT: Without desiring in any way to commit myself to opposition to some reasonable scheme of leasehold enfranchisement, I feel bound to oppose strongly this particular Bill for two special reasons, which I can explain very briefly. The first reason is that the Bill proposes the possible compulsory purchase of the freehold in all cases where the original term was not less than 30 years. Under these circumstances, it might be possible to compel the purchase of the freehold in the case of a property the lease of which was expiring within the next 12 months, and which has been bought by a bona-fide purchaser with the express intention of getting almost immediate vacant possession. The second reason that I wish to oppose this particular Bill is one which to my mind is very serious from a constitutional point of view. It is a Bill to put it in the power of a Minister of the Crown to decide a disputed question between two subjects in regard to the value of property. I submit that those two objections which I have raised are quite sufficient to make it, as I should say, essential from the common-sense point of view that this House, however much it may favour leasehold enfranchisement, should decline to give leave to bring in a Bill with such a title as this Measure.

Question put, and agreed to.

Mr. SPEAKER: Who is prepared to bring in the Bill?

Major MALONE: advanced to the Table to present the Bill.

Mr. THURTLE: On a point of Order. The House has not yet heard the names of those Members who are going to present this Bill.

Major MALONE: (stading at the Table): Mr. G. W. H. Jones, Major Tasker, Mr. Cassels, Lieut.-Colonel Dalrymple White, Mr. Harold Briggs, Mr. R. Morrison, and myself.

Mr. PENNY: On a, point of Order. In view of the fact that those names have been read out from the Treasury Bench, does it mean that the Bill is going to be supported by the Government?

Mr. SPEAKER: When the hon. and gallant Member for South Tottenham (Major Malone) becomes a Minister.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Major Malone, Mr. G. W. H. Jones, Major Tasker, Mr. Cassels, Lieut.-Colonel Dalrymple White, and Mr. Briggs.

LEASEHOLD ENFRANCHISEMENT BILL,

"to enable leaseholders of houses whose original leases were granted for a term of not less than thirty years to purchase the freehold estate and such other outstanding interests affecting the property on such equitable terms as, failing agreement, may be determined by the Minister of Health for the time being," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Friday, and to be printed. [Bill 36.]

LOCAL AUTHORITIES (MUNICIPAL BANKS) ENABLING.

Mr. SCURR: I beg to move:
That leave he given to bring in a Bill to authorise local authorities, if they think fit, to establish municipal banks in their area.
I have hopes that this Measure will have the same reception as that given to the previous Bill. Last year, this Bill was rejected, and the opposer on that occasion seemed to be under the impression that I was introducing a Bill for creating municipal building societies. This is nothing of the kind. It is a permissive Bill and will enable every local authority in the country, who so desire, but not otherwise, to institute a municipal bank on the same lines as the municipal bank at Birmingham. Birmingham cannot be accused of being in any sense a Socialist town. Those who are returned
to this House to represent that great city do not, except one, sit on this side. Therefore, the proposal and action of Birmingham should appeal to hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite.
The municipal bank at Birmingham came into existence on account of war legislation in 1916 in order to promote methods by which savings might be attracted to the War Loans. So great was the success, that in three years there was something like 30,000 depositors with something like £500,000 to their credit, and the Corporation of Birmingham came to this House and got special powers to establish the bank in 1919. It is to receive deposits and to guarantee the interest on and repayment of such deposits, to advance money to depositors desiring to purchase or acquire dwelling-houses in the City of Birmingham or any interest therein, and to utilise and invest the funds of the bank in accordance with the Act. In 1921, the sum received from depositors and the sum deposited was £1,226,000. In 1925, it was just under £3,500,000. During the five years that it has been in existence a sum of £975,000 has been advanced to depositors for the purchase of houses, and that, I think, ought to commend itself to hon. Members opposite. The number of transactions in the year just gone by is just over 1,000,000.
When we have a success like this, I think other boroughs, who desire to have these powers, ought to have them granted to them, and I propose under this Bill that every county council, borough council, urban district council, and metropolitan borough council shall have power, subject to Regulations and subject to the consent of the Ministry of Health, to establish municipal banks on the model of the Birmingham municipal bank. Those of us who desire, as hon. Members opposite say they desire, to encourage thrift among the working-classes, to encourage small people to put their savings where they will be safe, would rather that those savings were deposited in a municipal bank than that people were left, open, as at present, to become the victims of all kinds of cranks and schemes whereby very often their savings are lost. I think from every point of view this proposal ought to commend itself to every party in the House.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Scurr, Mr. Dalton, Mr. Beckett, Mr. Groves, Mr. Mackinder, Mr. Taylor, and Mr. Ritson.

LOCAL AUTHORITIES (MUNICIPAL BANKS) ENABLING BILL,

"to authorise local authorities, if they think fit, to establish Municipal Banks in their area," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 37.]

Orders of the Day — SUPPLY.

Considered in Committee.

[Mr. JAMES HOPE in the Chair.]

CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPARTMENTS SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1925–26.

CLASS I.

LABOUR AND HEALTH BUILDINGS, GREAT BRITAIN.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £12,000, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending On the 31st day of March, 1926, for Expenditure in respect of Employment Exchange and Insurance Buildings, Great Britain (including Ministries of Labour and Health).

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Mr. G. Locker-Lampson): I think, perhaps, in view of what transpired yesterday, that it would be more convenient if on these different Votes I made a very short preliminary statement, giving hon. Members a certain amount of information. The sum for which we are asking, £12,000, is rendered necessary by the Act passed last year after the main Estimate was framed dealing with widows' and orphans' pensions. Owing to the increase of staff, we have necessarily had to provide a certain amount of extra furniture, but I am glad to say that we have been able to find accommodation for the greater part of the increased staff in existing premises. So far as the Ministry of Health in England is concerned, the 600 additional staff have been housed with the existing staff at Acton. This has been done by rather more concentration of the staff at Acton and by transferring a certain number of the staff to the Ministry of Labour Record Office at Kew. So far as the Welsh Board of Health is concerned, the existing accommodation at Cardiff has proved sufficient for the additional staff required.
With regard to the Scottish Board of Health, for which an additional staff of 76 is required, we had to make a few additional hirings. In addition to this,
there are staffs at local offices of Health Insurance throughout the country, and these have been increased by about 200 members. In 75 per cent. of those local Health Offices we have been able to house the extra staff in existing premises. In the case of the remaining 25 per cent. it has been necessary to make additional hirings. In this is also included the expense incurred in moving people from Acton to Kew, and the expense of various internal movements that have taken place where extra staff has been brought in suddenly. The whole of these transactions have been carried out with a strict view to economy, and also with a view to the health of the people employed.

Mr. RHYS DAVIES: I desire to put a simple question relative to the details on page 8 of the Supplementary Estimates. I see that an increased sum of £12,000 is required, and it relates to "Insurance (National Health) Buildings (including the Ministry of Health)." The sum of £9,000 is required apparently for furniture. I take it that that is furniture required in connection with the expansion of the staff of the Ministry of Health, mainly in Whitehall—the staff required to carry on the work of the Widows' Pensions Act. I wish to know whether any new buildings are being acquired in order to house this staff, or whether the staff for widows' pensions is housed in the building of the Ministry of Health. As one who takes an interest in the administration of National Health Insurance and the Widows' Pensions scheme, I am anxious that the members of the staff should be brought together so that they can work in conjunction with each other. I know that the expenditure involved in this case will be recovered ultimately from the main pension fund account, and that this is only a passing transaction.

Sir FREDRIC WISE: I see an increase of £2,000 for "rents, etc." Is that an annual increase? Can the hon. Member give us details as to what the rents are for?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: The extra staff required for the English Ministry of Health is being housed at Acton with the existing staff. In order to do that a certain number of the people at Acton who belong to the Ministry of Labour have
been shifted to Kew, where there were already a good many people employed by the Ministry of Labour. Wherever it has been possible in the case of the English Ministry of Health we are keeping the Ministry of Health's staff together for the purpose of the Health Insurance Act and the Widows' Pensions Act of last year.

Mr. R. DAVIES: Then I understand that the additional staff required for the administration of the new scheme was drawn in the main from the staff which existed in connection with the administration of the Health Insurance Act. I am pleased to learn that the two staffs are working together in the same building.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I understand that the hon. Gentleman means to ask whether the existing staff is able to deal more or less with the Widows' Pensions Act. I daresay there may be a certain overlapping, but anyhow the additional staff required is working under the same roof with the staff that is there already. The extra rents mentioned in the Estimates are due to the fact that we have not been able entirely to place the extra staff in existing premises. We had to make additional hirings. We got as cheap hirings as possible, but presumably there will have to be an annual payment of rent because there is an additional staff. I do not say that it will remain at the present figure. Possibly we may be able to get cheaper hirings in future, but there is a permanent additional staff owing to the passing of the Act of last year.

Captain WEDGWOOD BENN: Would the hon. Gentleman say whether the charges are merely central charges or whether they cover the charges in the localities as well.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: These rents refer not only to the central charges, but to the provinces also.

Captain BENN: I notice in the main Estimates, under the heading of "Furniture," that, whereas for the London district there is a considerable increase in the last year, as far as Scotland is concerned there is a reduction in the Estimates of this year compared with the Estimates of last year. When I come to "rents" I find that, while the London rents are the same as the rents of last
year, the Scottish rents are reduced compared with the rents of last year. Of course, we understand that the new work for widows' and orphans' pensions involves a new staff and furniture. We desire that that furniture should be purchased in the most thrifty way. As a Scottish representative I am bound to ask whether the same measure of efficiency is being provided in the Scottish districts as appears to be necessary in districts in England.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: The fact was that in the case of England and Wales we were able to find enough accommodation in existing premises, but, unfortunately, in the case of the Scottish Ministry of Health, we had not enough accommodation for the extra staff. We had to go outside and make further hirings. Part of this £2,000 includes the staff in that respect.

Mr. GRIFFITHS: The hon. Gentleman has told us that there has been an additional staff of 60 in Wales, and of 76 in Scotland. I understood that when the Widows' Pensions Act was passed and when the pensions were paid, there would be a reduction in outdoor and parish relief. If that redaction takes place, could the Ministry not transfer the guardians' staff concerned so as to make up the additional staff required, instead of appointing others to the Ministry staff? The hon. Member also said that in Cardiff the Ministry already had accommodation. If that be so, why should more furniture be needed. The amount to be spent on furniture is enormous. It would furnish every working-class house in my constituency. The expenditure is £11,000 for an extra staff of 60 in Wales and of 76 in Scotland. I see that the original Estimate was £2,605, and that the revised Estimate is £11,605, or an increase of £9,000. What an Estimate! There seems to be something wrong somewhere. Either the people who made the Estimate did not know their business, or something is happening of which I would like to know more details.

Mr. W. BAKER: Yesterday I put a series of questions to the hon. Gentleman and I regret that five of them remained without no answer. I hope that to-day I shall be more successful in that particular. I understand that the increase of staff resulting from the new
Act is a total of 600. The additional sum required for furniture is £9,000, and, whilst it would ill become me to say anything about money being spent on the proper requirements of the Department, I would like to have more detailed information so that this Committee may understand the transaction and reasonable criticism may become possible. In the original Estimate a saving of £275 was claimed, as against the previous year, for the item "Furniture," a saving of £745 for the item "Removals," and a saving of £1,600 for the item "Rents." But unfortunately, as the result of this Supplementary Estimate, a large part of the savings claimed has been lost. I readily admit that, compared with the previous year, the Department has succeeded in making a saving of £35,000, which is a very creditable sum.
In addition to seeking information with regard to the furniture, I shall be much obliged if the Minister will explain whether the expenses for removals refer to the removal of official furniture, or whether part of it refers in any sense to the removal of the furniture of individual offices, as a result of the transfer or increase of work. Will he also give us a little more detailed information with regard to the item "Rents," because I am certain that his explanation was not quite clear to myself and others?

Mr. BUCHANAN: In regard to "furniture" and "rents," can the hon. Gentleman detail the amount spent in Scotland, as is done in the main Estimates? In the main Estimates, as the hon. Gentleman knows, the sum spent in each country is definitely allocated. Is it not possible to indicate in the Supplementary Estimate the amounts allocated to the various countries? I understood from the hon. Gentleman's reply to the hon. and gallant Member for Leith (Captain Benn) that in Scotland more money is required because of the difficulty of getting sites. I do not know if it will be in order to point out one respect in which I think this money is being badly spent. I do not grudge the amount which we are asked to vote, but I think the Office of Works, when asked to spend this extra sum on the housing of the staff required for these purposes, ought to have gone into the whole question of buildings in this connection. This
money is largely wasted because it is being used in renting premises when the Office of Works might have tried to get some permanent dwelling for the housing of all these services. The present position in connection with widows' pensions, old age pensions and unemployment insurance is that the men and women concerned have to call at various different offices. It would be much better in cities like Glasgow, to have a central building where a person could learn all about unemployment insurance, health insurance and pensions, and I suggest it would be cheaper than the present method. I am inclined to disagree with the view expressed by an hon. Member just now that this expenditure is too lavish. I have visited one of the offices in Glasgow on which some of the money has been spent, and I demur to the statement that it is lavish. I am not grumbling at the amount spent on furniture or even at the amount involved in the removals, but I ask the hon. Gentleman, instead of coming back in future to Parliament for comparatively small Supplementary Estimates of this kind, to centralise these services which are so interlocked. I ask him to consider whether it would not be economical to the Government, as well as for the greater convenience of the people concerned to do so, and whether it would not avoid a considerable waste of money, time and energy.

Commander WILLIAMS: I quite realise that we are bound to have an increase in this particular Estimate because of the Contributory Pensions Act, but I would like the hon. Gentleman to explain why furniture forms such a prominent item in all these Estimates. Is it the case that the Government are trying to substitute British furniture for what is, perhaps, inferior furniture of other kinds, in the various Departments? I believe that point was raised yesterday by an hon. Member opposite who is naturally anxious to see that the Government, if they have any money to spend, should spend it in the best possible way for the advantage of our own people. I would like to know where the bulk of the furniture comes from and if the Government by expending this money are able to help the country in any way at the present time? I am not, however, sure that it is a right policy for the Government to expend such a large amount on new furniture, and I
think they ought to try to do without it as long as they can—firstly, because the taxpayer has not very much money to spare and, secondly, because if the Government create a demand for furniture by continually going into the market and buying, they tend to raise the price and thus make difficulties for the people who are occupying the houses erected under various Government housing schemes The Government ought to exercise every possible form of economy. As regards the question of removals I am not satisfied that the increase shown under this head is justified. If it were only a, question of doubling the amount due to removals, that would be something of importance, but this is much more than a 100 per cent. increase, and it seems to me that in Government Departments there is a great deal too much of the practice of simply moving people round from one place to another.

Mr. LANSBURY: Like a game of "general post."

Commander WILLIAMS: One sees it in all places. I know that the Under-Secretary is in a difficult position. We all sympathise with him in having to deal with these questions, and many of us on this side would like to see those directly responsible for the Departments concerned showing some interest in the Estimates. I would, however, like an answer from the hon. Gentleman to my questions, namely, why are these removals so constant and are they at all necessary?

Mr. MAXTON: I regret I did not hear the initial explanatory statement of the hon. Gentleman in charge of the Vote. As soon as I saw his name on the annunciator I hurried to the Chamber, but I judge that his explanation was not very elaborate as he was concluding it when I came in. Therefore he will excuse me if I raise some point which he has already explained. I should like to know, with reference to the £9,000 for furniture for the staff dealing with widows' and old age pensions, if this amount was calculated on the number which the Treasury and the Minister of Health estimated would come under the scheme of widows' pensions or whether it has been estimated on the number who have actually come under that scheme. If the
former basis has been adopted, then, since the figures have proved much lower than the original estimate, this sum would seem to require adjustment in the direction of being reduced. Is this £9,000 required to deal with the anticipated number of 40,000 widows' pensions or with the actual number of 20,000 widows' pensions?
I notice that all the furniture mentioned in the Estimate is for the accommodation of the staff. Have the Office of Works or the Ministry of Labour or the Ministry of Health ever considered the desirability of providing furniture for the accommodation of the pensioners and others who are required to visit these offices periodically? We know that in Employment Exchanges no regard is had for the comfort and convenience of the men who go there endeavouring to find employment. The queue outside the door of the Employment Exchange is one of our national public scandals, and it is a great shame that men, in addition to suffering the other indignities which surround the lot of the unemployed should have to stand in this way, very often in inclement weather.

The CHAIRMAN: I think that is a matter which would be more appropriate on a Vote dealing with the Ministry of Labour. The hon. Member has adduced his illustration he need not pursue it.

Mr. MAXTON: I was merely going to say that if the practice to which I refer is unfair in the case of comparatively strong and healthy young or middle-aged men or women, it would be infinitely worse if similar conditions were applied to old age pensioners and widows. Very often a widow coming under this pension scheme is a widow with young children, and if a mother has to go to one of these offices on business connected with her pension, she may be compelled to carry an infant in her arms. In our branch Post Offices and even in the big general Post Offices there is frequently not a single chair upon which a woman who is carrying an infant may rest herself while waiting to be attended by the official in charge of her case. If we can provide easy chairs and stools to the value of £9,000, a part of that expenditure should go for the benefit of the pensioners who, after all, as we are told in a footnote to the Estimate, are paying
a large proportion of the cost of the furniture. I should like to know if the hon. Gentleman has given any consideration to that aspect of this expenditure?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I had better dispose in the first place of two questions which do not come within the scope of the Office of Works. The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) asked if there could not be a centralisation of these services. That is a matter of policy which has nothing to do with the Office of Works and I cannot deal with it to-day. It is a subject for consideration by the Department concerned. Another question of policy was raised by the hon. Member for Pontypool (Mr. Griffiths) who asked if staff hitherto employed at other work could be used for this purpose. That again would be a question of policy, and I am afraid I cannot deal with it. Nearly all the questions seem to have concentrated themselves on the subject of furniture, but I would like to remind hon. Members that the reason why furniture looms so largely in proportion to the rest of the Vote is that we are spending practically nothing, or very little, on accommodation. We have been able, luckily, to find accommodation in existing premises. Supposing we had had to find new accommodation for all these people, you would have found rents amounting to, say, £20,000, and furniture would not then have bulked so largely in proportion. If hon. Members look at the number of people for whom we have had to find furniture, they will see that there is 936 additional staffing altogether, and if they take the sum allotted to furniture, £9,000, that works out at only about £10 per head. It is not merely a question of chairs. I have made a note of these things myself, and may have left some items out, but my list includes such things, as filing cabinets, chairs, tables, bookcases, blinds, linoleums, and so on.

Mr. BUCHANAN: No mention of mirrors for typists.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I said I may not have made a complete list, and I do not think that, taking that into consideration, about £10 per head is at all an extravagant figure. The hon. Member for Bridgeton asked whether any furniture was being supplied for the visitors. I think he might take it for granted that this sum of money must
necessarily include a certain number of chairs for people who come on business connected with the office. It would be a strange thing indeed if, in the allocation of furniture to the staff who had to deal with a certain business, they had not also allocated furniture for the purposes of that business, which would necessarily include the visitors. I agree that it is an important point that there should be chairs for the people who come to visit these offices, and I will make a note of it and see that chairs are provided for these people, but I cannot help thinking they must be included already. A question was asked about rent, and I thought I had really explained about that. The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) said that, instead of leasing these buildings, we ought to buy them. The Office of Works in the past has generally found that if it first leased a building and then looked about, it was very often able to find a cheap building by purchase afterwards, but if it went straight away into the market in order to buy, very likely it would have to pay a much bigger price than if it had waited a little.

Mr. BUCHANAN: Can the hon. Member give us in detail what is spent in England, Scotland, and Wales under this Supplementary Vote, in the same way as it is done in the main Estimates?

Mr. R. DAVIES: I am sure the Committee is very much obliged for the explanation given by the hon. Member in charge of the Estimates, and I feel sure he will appreciate the keenness of the Committee in inquiring into these Estimates, because the £9,000 in particular will not come out of State funds. It will ultimately be taken out of the widows' pensions fund, recoverable, as I have said already, from that fund by the Office of Works. I desire to ask if the hon. Gentleman can give us an explanation as to whether the £9,000 covers, for the time being, all the expenditure involved in connection with furnishing the offices in which the staff is being housed in connection with the administration of the widows' pensions scheme.

Mr. STORRY-DEANS: In furnishing these places, has the Office of Works made any inquiries as to whether there is any surplus furniture in other Government Departments? For instance, the number
of persons employed at the Ministry of Pensions is decreasing year by year. These servants must have used some furniture, which is now surplus, and I should like to know whether that could not be used for new Departments or sub-Departments, such as the Widows' Pensions Department, or if not, what becomes of it? Is it sold at any time if a price can be obtained, or what becomes of it? Then there must be still a good deal of what I may call War furniture about—furniture that was used in various Departments during the War. Cannot any of that be used again? I am quite sure the Minister must recognise that in these days, when we are running on such a fine margin in the public funds, every step should be taken to secure economies even with trifles.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I have not consulted my advisers under the Gallery on that last point, because I remember that a similar question was asked of me last year, and that the answer was that we always do what we can to use surplus furniture where extra furniture is required elsewhere, but very often it is more expensive to cart furniture long distances about the country than to buy perhaps cheaper furniture on the spot. We do, however, use surplus furniture if we can. I think I can satisfy the mind of my hon. Friend the Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Davies). The sum of £9,000 is the final figure, I am informed. In regard to Scotland, I hope it will not disappoint the hon. Member for Globals, but it is not a vast sum of money that has been spent on furniture in Scotland. I understand that about £400 only has been spent there.

Mr. BUCHANAN: Why?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: In reply to the hon. Member for Bridgeton, I find that chairs are provided for the visitors.

Mr. T. WILLIAMS: There is one question which the Under-Secretary failed to answer, and I should like him to give the Committee some idea as to who is charged from time to time with the responsibility for purchasing furniture in large or small quantities, whether it is purchased from one particular firm or from many firms, and whether, because of the quantity of furniture that must be purchased—in this
case, obviously, hundreds of pounds would be spent in one town or city—any concession is given to the Government for purchasing large quantities. Is there any direct benefit given to the Government because of the large amount of money they expend? I should also like to ask the Under-Secretary if either he or his colleague has ever thought that it might be desirable for the Government to supply themselves with furniture?

The CHAIRMAN: That is rather a large question of policy, and I do not think it can arise on this Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. WILLIAMS: I do not want to transgress your ruling, Mr. Chairman, nor to introduce matters that would require legislation, but I think it is fair to ask what are the real conditions operating when furniture has to be purchased for various Government Departments, if there are any particular stores from which the furniture is purchased, and what, if any, direct benefits are derived. There is one other question which I do not think has been answered in the previous very courteous replies given by the Under-Secretary, and that has to do with the question of rents. When a large portion of an existing building is taken over, who arranges the rent that shall operate for either a long or a short period? Is it done by an officer from one of the Departments, and has the auditor access to the various accounts in connection with such matters? As the hon. and learned Member for the Park Division of Sheffield (Mr. Storry-Deans) said, in these days of very narrow margins, we at least ought to know that no moneys are expended that could be saved, owing to the loose purchasing of furniture or loose tenancies of buildings, and I think that any material that we may have on hand might very well be used before we enter into further commitments. If the Under-Secretary can satisfy the Committee that this furniture is purchased on the best possible terms, and that these rentals are fixed in accordance with equity, I have no doubt the Committee would be prepared to allow the Vote to go through.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I want to make a correction in connection with an
answer that I gave in regard to what had been spent in Scotland under this heading. As a matter of fact, I made a mistake in saying that it was a few hundreds, and it should have been nearly a thousand pounds.

5.0 P.M.

Mr. BUCHANAN: I see the Secretary of State for Scotland present, and while the hon. Gentleman who has spoken for the Government has shown great ability, there must necessarily be a great deal that he cannot claim to know in regard to Scotland. I want to ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he is satisfied that this sum of nearly £1,000 that has been spent in Scotland is sufficient to make those premises up to the standard required. I visit all manner of public buildings in Scotland, from prisons to post offices, and in the course of my travels to these places I occasionally visit one which caters for his constituency in addition to my own, and it is fortunate in regard to these buildings that his constituency, although more aristocratic in temperament, only gets the same treatment as mine, which is of a poor character. Is the right hon. Gentleman satisfied that the sum spent in Glasgow, where, I understand; he has been spending a good deal of time recently, on the offices in St. Vincent Street, is sufficient? Is he satisfied that this additional £1,000 spent in Scotland, and particularly in Glasgow, has been spent in the most advisable way? The hon. Member for Bridgeton (Mr. Maxton) raised a very important point, namely, the accommodation provided for people who are waiting in order to interview certain Government officials concerned with old age pensions and widows' pensions. I must commend the Government for having got a very good type of person to go into the question of widows' pensions, but while the applicants receive every civility from them, I am positive that this £1,000 might be spent with more advantage in providing more accommodation for them. Now that we have the advantage of the presence of one of the Scottish officers connected with health matters, I would like to know if he is satisfied. Now that he has been raised to the status of Secretary of State his obligations to Scotland have been increased. I would like to know from him if he is satisfied that this amount of –1,000 spent in Scotland on
furniture represents adequate expenditure in a country now so important in the national life of this country.

Mr. CHARLETON: I would like to ask if the Office of Works is engaged in business buying and selling furniture. I see in the Report of the Committee of Public Accounts:
Receipts have in recent years been largely swollen by the disposal of stores and furniture. These receipts in the year 1923–24 amount to £877,124.
Is the Office of Works this year still selling furniture; and, if so, why are they spending £9,000 on furniture and asking us for this particular Estimate? It ought to be gone into It seems to me that when an office wants furniture, they buy it; and when another office has some for disposal, they sell it. There seems to be no co-ordination. A Government that tells the world they are out to economise ought to go into this. We ought not to buy new furniture at very high prices and then sell other furniture just as good.

Commander WILLIAMS: The hon. Gentleman forgot to tell us in his reply whether this is British furniture. We know, of course, that it was British furniture he was dealing with yesterday, but because his Department provided British furniture for one Government office it does not follow that they will do it for another.

Mr. KELLY: With regard to the increase of rent, how much increase of rent is being paid in the case of the Rochdale exchange? Why is it that they are still paying rent for a building altogether inadequate—so inadequate that on a recent occasion the police inspector found it necessary to smash the windows in order that people attending the exchange might not be suffocated for want of ventilation? That is the kind of building occupied by the Ministry at the present time, and for which, I believe, they are paying additional rent. I am told that in this item there is some amount of additional rent allowed for that place. It looks bad for a Government to come to the House at this time with a revised Estimate and ask for more money for rent and furniture for an exchange at Rochdale that is totally unfitted for the purpose that they occupy it for.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: Perhaps I might answer that question now. The hon. Member was talking about the Ministry of Labour. This Vote applies only to the Ministry of Health. The Ministry of Labour is the title of the main Estimate, but the Sub-head refers only to the Ministry of Health.

Mr. LANSBURY: I beg to move to reduce the Vote by £100.
This is a very important Vote and as we have not been at it for an hour yet I do not want to hurry it. All the questions which have been raised up to the present have been really important ones. The hon. Gentleman has my sympathy in having to answer all these questions, but it is his duty and we must do ours too. There is a well-known song,
Where do flies go in winter-time?
What I would like to know is where all the furniture has gone that was in all those buildings on the lake and along the Embankment and scattered up and down the country. If I am told it is sold, then it is pretty bad policy to sell right out, since the Government must at all times be wanting new furniture to replace old furniture and for new offices. Before we let this Estimate go we ought to have a clear statement as to what furniture the Commissioner has in hand, where it is stored and whether some of it would not be useful for this particular purpose. I know that the price you get for selling furniture is very different from the price you pay when you go to buy it. What does the Commissioner or his Department consider that they ought to do with the furniture that is redundant at present?
We have not been told on this Vote yet what the furniture consists of Ten pounds per head for each officer cannot be considered a moderate estimate when you look at the average of an ordinary office where they employ all kinds of people and where often the furniture is only a single stool. I understand that all this money is going to be spread over a large number of places. I do not think myself that it will be necessary to spend so large a sum of money. The House ought to ask that detailed estimates and specifications of what was required should be put before them. Some Committee ought then to examine them and see in detail whether they really are reasonably required. I do not know whether this
sum of £9,000 that I am asked to vote is really required. I do not know whether the Commissioner has in his warehouses furniture that would suit this particular case or not. On the question of British produced furniture—and we are all in favour of supporting home industries and the British Empire—I want to know are there any articles made of Austrian oak such as roll-top desks? Is there any mahogany, Spanish mahogany or mahogany from Africa? We ought to know whether the Government are going to take the wood out of our own forests or from Australia or Canada. My information is that if we went into it thoroughly we should find a little of it at any rate came from America, but as we are real good pals of America, cousins and all that, we must not object. Yet it is not supporting home industries. I would like somebody to tell me what the wood is and where we get it from.
I would like an answer to the question put by the hon. Member for South Leeds (Mr. Charleton). How is this furniture bought? Who goes about it? Who is the particular official? Does he advertise for it? I have not seen any advertisement in the newspapers for this particular furniture. Is it quite in order to buy anywhere and everywhere A local authority would not be allowed to spend about £50 without the sanction of the Minister of Health unless there was a contract and advertisements. I do not see why a Government Department should be trusted more than a local authority. I do not think there is more purity there than in a local authority. I would like to know how this furniture is bought, and I should like to emphasise the point made by one of my hon. Friends that we might see some of these redundant factories that have been closed down manufacturing our own furniture, so that then we might be sure that we were getting what we were paying for. At present we have not the least idea whether we are getting the right thing or not. I am not sure, apart from the question of material from which the furniture is made, whether it is even made in this country. I know there is a good deal of furniture imported. Personally, I do not mind it being imported if the standards of wages and conditions are not such as to pull down our standards. I would like to know from the hon. Gentleman exactly what are the terms and conditions under which this
furniture is bought, and also the country of origin of the material out of which the furniture is made. An hon. Member below me mentions Russia. If there is any wood from that country, you will probably find you are dealing with the hated Bolsheviks. I do not know what hon. Members opposite will do about that, but they cannot help themselves.
When you come to "Removals," I do not know what that means. Whom are you removing? What does it really mean? I should like an answer to that question, because it cannot be that you are removing the officials' homes, or that you are removing any of the goods and chattels from offices in one particular place to some other. But you are estimating to buy furniture, and I do not see of what these removals consist, I have looked at the Estimates brought in a year ago, and what struck me about them was what I called attention to yesterday, and I hoped the hon. Member for Ilford (Sir F. Wise) might have helped the Committee in the matter. It appears to have become the fashion now to cut down the original Estimate, and then to make quite sure you can get a Supplementary one afterwards. Last year the Estimates were, apparently, cut down, and now, of course, we have got this Supplementary one. I admit that this one is not quite on all fours with the one which we discussed yesterday, but I daresay the argument does to some extent apply. I really do not understand, and I did not understand when the hon. Gentleman introduced the Estimate, what the removals consist of, and I repeat I hope he will tell us what is really meant.
Then, as regards Rents, I should have thought that with the reduction that is bound to take place in the work of the Pensions Department, it would not be necessary to get any new buildings, and that we might have got along with the buildings we possess at present, because, quite apart from any question of economy, and in the natural order of things, the work of the War Pensions Department grows less each year, and the number of people who are employed by the Pensions Department grows smaller each year. When you come to public buildings, there are throughout the whole country, I think I can say truthfully, thousands of public buildings that are
empty all day, and which could be, and ought to be, quite naturally used for purposes such as are required here. I do not think £2,000 is a big sum. But it is not the sum it is the principle. I think there is scarcely a municipal authority in the country that has not got a public building, with plenty of room for storage of documents, books and so on, that could be placed at the disposal of the Government for this particular kind of work, and I think the Commissioner of Works, whom, I suppose, the hon. Gentleman is representing, ought to consider, before taking new buildings, whether there are not other public buildings which could be utilised. These are some points in connection with this Estimate, and so that we may really get an answer, and so that the subject of this furniture and the removals may be very thoroughly explored, I beg to move the reduction.

Mr. SCURR: There is one question I should like to put in regard to this very large increase in the sum for Furniture, and that is as to whether this furniture has been procured from contractors simply as the result of obtaining a price, or putting it out to tender, or whether it has been done by direct labour. Generally, of course, from the policy which we know commends itself to His Majesty's Ministers at the present time, we can assume it has been done by private contract, and, if that be so, it will probably account for a very large increase in the Estimate. But, after all, as my hon. Friend who has just been speaking has pointed out very clearly, the expenditure per head is really an enormous sum. Ten pounds for every seat which has to be occupied seems to me to be going to reckless extravagance all the way through, and, therefore, very large profits must have got into the hands of private contractors. Probably, when the balance-sheets of the various firms in the furniture trade are issued, very high dividends will be declared as a result of the policy which the Government are pursuing. If, on the other hand, the work has been done by direct labour, it may be possible that there is a bigger amount of furniture procured, and we shall know the savings which have accrued to the community by means of public enterprise. I think it is an exceedingly important matter, and I hope the Minister will reply.
I also want to take up the point raised by the hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) as to the necessity of having committees to go into the details of these Estimates. It is a great public scandal that there should be at this season a Supplementary Estimate of £5,205,564 presented to us. Going through the volume of last year's Estimates, we see all sorts of savings alleged to be put there in order to reduce those Estimates, and then when we come to the Supplementary Estimates we find them brought in under other heads. It is bad accountancy, bad estimating, and shows the slipshod method in which His Majesty's Ministers are administering the affairs of the nation at the present time. Accordingly, I cordially support the reduction moved by my hon. Friend.

Major COHEN: I should like to ask the hon. Gentleman who is in charge of this Estimate whether any of the furniture is made in factories which employ only disabled ex-service men. There is one at Enham Village Centre, another the Preston Hall Industries, and Lord Roberts' Workshops. The Ministry of Labour and the Ministry of Pensions a very short time ago also had training centres where furniture was, made. I should like to have an assurance that some of the furniture made in those places was purchased by the Government.

Lord HENRY CAVENDISH BENTINCK: I should like to support what my hon. and gallant Friend has just said. The hon. Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) asked a number of pertinent questions, such as the part of the world from which the wood comes. I rise to ask whether any of this funiture is made by the institutions which have been supported by public-spirited and benevolent-minded people for the employment of ex-soldiers. These institutions have available very up-to-date machinery, and I believe are quite capable of supplying all this furniture. I do not ask that ex-soldiers should be spoon-fed, or that the Government Departments should indulge in any extravagant policy, but I do ask that, other things being equal, preference should be given to the ex-soldier, and even if the Government Departments should depart in some slight degree from the rigidity
of closely-cut prices, and allow a certain amount of humanity to enter into their purchases, I do not think any Member of this House would find very great fault.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: Perhaps I had better deal straight away with the question raised by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Fairfield Division of Liverpool (Major Cohen) and my Noble Friend the Member for South Nottingham (Lord H. Cavendish-Bentinck). So far as I know, up to the present, except, possibly, in connection with a very small proportion, none of the furniture has been made by ex-service men as such. But it is an interesting suggestion, and I shall be very glad to see what can be done in all other circumstances. I promise my hon. Friends that we will look into the matter, and see what can be done. Several hon. Members asked how this furniture was ordered, and I rather gathered that the hon. Member for Don Valley (Mr. T. Williams) suggested it was given to one contractor. That is not at all the case. It is put out to tender, and there is any amount of competition to make the furniture for the Office of Works. There is a special staff in the Office of Works who deal with this, and I hope they are business men. They review the various tenders that come in having regard to the specifications of the firms involved, and we get our furniture, therefore, at as cheap a rate as possible. The hon. Member for the Don Valley and another hon. Member raised a question about the sale of furniture.
The office of Works does not sell good furniture—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"]—or do not sell the best. There have been sales of surplus furniture which is not good enough for His Majesty's Departments of State. As a matter of fact, there have been considerable sales lately of furniture that has been in use for the purposes of pensions work in past years and covered by this Estimate. As to the question of the purchase of the furniture, the Office of Works has purchased British furniture made in this country as far as ever possible. I am afraid I cannot say further than that, or where the timber comes from. I think I have, perhaps, covered the various questions put to me. I might say that I hope the Committee do not think that these questions are not very
carefully looked into by the Office of Works, which has done everything possible in this direction. Great pressure has been brought to bear upon us by the Treasury to economise in the various Departments, and the Office of Works has gone through these Estimates with care.

Mr. W. BAKER: It was my original intention to secure more information in regard to this Vote, but the Minister's reply has really made the position very much worse than we suspected it was. It now appears to be clear that not only is a large sum being spent on furniture in regard to which we have no detailed information whatever. I am not concerned to criticise the expenditure. What I am concerned about is the absence of information regarding the details. The Minister has just replied, and he has stated that, in addition to the many figures placed before us, there is an unknown quantity of surplus furniture which has been transferred to the Ministry for the purpose stated. All I can say is that I think such a reply is extremely unsatisfactory, and we are entitled to a more candid statement than we have received up till now. It really is extraordinary, having regard to the large number of people connected with St. Dunstans and other institutions to which work could be given, and which people are urging, to find that the Government are not themselves pursuing that policy. I do hope the Minister will see that these points are very carefully considered, and that in subsequent years we shall be supplied with clearer statements, quite definite, giving details of the whole of the transactions in the Estimates.

Mr. BATEY: The answer of the Under-Secretary makes it essential that we should have further information. We are entitled to that, taking the whole of the Supplementary Estimates, and in view of the answers which the hon. Gentleman has given to hon. Members who have put questions. He told the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) that certain of this money had been spent in Scotland. When he said that, I tried to calculate in my own mind how much was spent in the North of England, and I think I am entitled to ask that? Then the Minister, in his reply, surprised me when he said that the furniture was completely new furniture. Before he answered I scarcely thought it was. If this is new furniture
then we are entitled to ask where it came from? We on this side are interested to know whether it was made under trade union conditions? I should also like to know, going beyond that point, in what part of the country this furniture was made? The Under-Secretary said it was put up for competition and so decided. Could he tell us just where that furniture was made?
This new furniture upon which the £9,000 is being spent ought to have been delivered without any cost of delivery. My hon. Friend the Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) pointed to the £1,000 for removals in the Supplementary Estimates. Before he mentioned the matter I was inclined to ask whether the £1,000 was for for the removal of this new furniture. We are entitled to know just for what was this £1,000? Was it for the removal of this new furniture? Did the Ministry order furniture and get it delivered to certain offices and then find that it cost £1,000 to remove it from one office to another office? One would have thought that the Ministry would have been able, when they gave an order for the furniture, to have said just where they wanted the furniture delivered, and that furniture ought to have been so delivered without costing a single penny. This £1,000 for removal rather puzzles me. I should like the Minister to explain it. I am bound to confess that I cannot understand it. The Widows' and Orphans' Pensions Act started at the beginning of January, and this Supplementary Estimate is only to carry us up to the end of March—three months. Yet we have this stupendous figure. My hon. Friend the Member for Bow and Bromley (Mr. Lansbury) suggests that a couple of thousand pounds for rents is not a large sum, and that he is not objecting to it. I am not so much used to dealing with figures as be is. £2,000 is an enormous amount of money If I had £2,000 I would think myself a Baron Rothschild. £2,000 for rents is a very big figure just for the purpose of buildings to carry on the Widows' and Orphans' Pensions Act from 1st January to 31st March.
We ought to know where these buildings are situated. I thought I was putting plenty of questions to the Under-Secretary, but my colleagues here are making bullets for me to fire. I should like to know where these buildings are situated
that are going to cost us £2,000. I do not want to exasperate hon. Members opposite, or to waste the time of the Committee, but I am entitled to ask these questions, and not only where the buildings are situated, but what is there to account for this huge increase of rent in three months? Who are the landlords? Where are the buildings situated? How many rooms are there in the buildings? That is an important matter, I was under the impression that the Office of Works—for I was so taught when I first came to the House of Commons—was in existence to prevent the separate Ministries, Health, Labour, &c., buying furniture for themselves. I cannot see why we should have to spend at a time like this. When the Government is pledged up to the hilt for economy! We

are spending money here and before very many weeks are over the Government will be cutting down expenditure for the sake of economy, so that the Office of Works, having control of this and other Departments, ought to have been able to have kept their eye over all the Departments using furniture. There are one or two thoughts which came into my mind, and I should be obliged to the Minister if, before we pass this Vote, he will give us the information for which we have asked.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: rose in place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Question put, "That the Question be now put."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 253; Noes, 132.

Division No. 9.]
AYES.
[5.43. p.m.


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.
Gunston, Captain D. W.


Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir. James T.
Cohen, Major J. Brunel
Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry


Ainsworth, Major Charles
Colfox, Major Wm. Phillips
Harland, A.


Alexander, E. E. (Leyton)
Conway, Sir W. Martin
Harrison, G. J. C.


Alexander, Sir Wm. (Glasgow, Cent'l)
Cooper, A. Duff
Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)


Allen, J. Sandeman (L'pool, Derby)
Craig, Ernest (Chester, Crewe)
Haslam, Henry C.


Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir. Henry
Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.


Atkinson, C.
Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.
Henderson, Lieut.-Col. V. L. (Bootle)


Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley
Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)
Henn, Sir Sydney H.


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Crookshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)
Hennessy, Major J. R. G.


Barclay-Harvey, C. M.
Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Gainsbro)
Herbert, S. (York, N. R., Scar, & Wh'by)


Barnett, Major Sir Richard
Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert
Hills, Major John Walter


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Curzon, Captain Viscount
Hoare, Lt. Col. Rt. Hon. Sir. S. J. G.


Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)
Dalziel, Sir Davison
Hohler, Sir Gerald Fitzroy


Bentinck, Lord Henry Cavendish-
Davidson, J. (Hertt'd, Hemel Hempst'd)
Holbrook, Sir Arthur Richard


Berry, Sir George
Davidson, Major-General Sir John H.
Holland, Sir Arthur


Betterton, Henry B.
Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)
Holt, Captain H. P.


Birchall, Major J. Dearman
Davies, Sir Thomas (Cirencester)
Homan, C. W. J.


Blundell, F. N.
Dawson, Sir Philip
Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)


Boothby, R. J. G.
Dixey, A. C.
Hope, Sir Harry (Forfar)


Bourns, Captain Robert Croft
Dixon, Captain Rt. Hon. H.
Hopkins, J. W. W.


Bowater, Sir T. Vansittart
Eden, Captain Anthony
Howard, Captain Hon. Donald


Bowyer, Capt. G. E. W.
Elveden, Viscount
Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney. N.)


Brass, Captain W.
England, Colonel A.
Hudson, R. S. (Cumberl'nd, Whiteh'n)


Brassey, Sir Leonard
Erskine, James Malcolm Monteith
Hume-Williams, Sir W. Ellis


Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive
Fairfax, Captain J. G.
Huntingfield, Lord


Briggs, J. Harold
Falle, Sir Bertram G.
Hurd, Percy A.


Briscoe, Richard George
Fanshawe, Commander G. D.
Illfte, Sir Edward M.


Brittain, Sir Harry
Fermoy, Lord
Inskip, Sir Thomas Walker H.


Brocklebank, C. E. R.
Fielden, E. B.
Jackson, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. F. S.


Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.
Forestier-Walker, Sir L.
Jackson, Sir H. (Wandsworth, Cen'l)


Broun-Lindsay, Major H.
Forrest, W.
James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert


Brown, Maj. D. C. (N'th'l'd., Hexham)
Foster, Sir Harry S.
Jephcott, A. R.


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Berks, Newb'y)
Fraser, Captain Ian
Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)


Bullock, Captain M.
Frece, Sir Walter de
Kindersley, Major Guy M.


Burman, J. B.
Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.
King, Captain Henry Douglas


Burton, Colonel H. W.
Gadie, Lieut.-Col. Anthony
Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement


Butler, Sir Geoffrey
Galbraith, J. F. W.
Knox, Sir Alfred


Butt, Sir Alfred
Ganzoni, Sir John
Lamb, J. Q.


Cadogan, Major Hon. Edward
Gates, Percy
Lane Fox, Col. Rt. Hon. George R.


Cautley, Sir Henry S.
Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton
Lister, Cunliffe-, Rt. Hon. Sir. Philip


Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir. Evelyn (Aston)
Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)


Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Gilmour, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir John
Loder, J. de V.


Chapman, Sir S.
Glyn, Major R. G. C.
Looker, Herbert William


Charteris, Brigadier-General J.
Goff, Sir Park
Lougher, L.


Christie, J. A.
Gower, Sir Robert
Lumley, L. R.


Churchman, Sir Arthur C.
Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.
Lynn, Sir R. J.


Clarry, Reginald George
Greene, W. P. Crawford
MacAndrew, Charles Glen


Clayton, G. C.
Gretton, Colonel John
Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)


Cobb, Sir Cyril
Grotrian, H. Brent
Macdonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)


Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.
Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.
McDonnell, Colonel Hon. Angus


MacIntyre, Ian
Preston, William
Streatfeild, Captain S. R.


McLean, Major A.
Price, Major C. W. M.
Tasker, Major R. Inlgo


Macmillan, Captain H.
Radford, E. A.
Thom, Lt.-Col. J. G. (Dumbarton)


Macnaghten, Hon. Sir Malcolm
Rawson, Sir Alfred Cooper
Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)


McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John
Reid, Capt. A. S. C. (Warrington)
Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)


Macquisten, F. A.
Reid, D. D. (County Down)
Titchfield, Major the Marquess of


Maitland, Sir Arthur D. Steel-
Remnant, Sir James
Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement


Malone, Major P. B.
Richardson, Sir P. W. (Sur'y, Ch'ts'y)
Vaughan-Morgan, Col. K. P.


Manningham-Buller, Sir Mervyn
Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)
Wallace, Captain D. E.


Margesson, Captain D.
Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)
Ward, Lt.-Col. A. L. (Kingston-on-Hull)


Marriott, Sir J. A. R.
Ropner, Major L.
Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.


Merriman, F. B.
Ruggles-Brise, Major E. A.
Warrender, Sir Victor


Meyer, Sir Frank
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)
Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otley)


Milne, J. S. Wardlaw-
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)
Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)


Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)
Sandeman, A. Stewart
Wells, S. R.


Mitchell, Sir W. Lane (Streatham)
Sanders, Sir Robert A.
Wheler, Lieut.-Col. Granville C. H.


Moles, Thomas
Sandon, Lord
White, Lieut.-Colonel G. Dalrymple


Moore, Lieut.-Colonel T. C. R. (Ayr)
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.
Williams, A. M. (Cornwall, Northern)


Moore, Sir Newton J.
Savery, S. S.
Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)


Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T. C.
Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W. R., Sowerby)
Wilson, Sir C. H. (Leeds, Central)


Moreing, Captain A. H.
Sheffield, Sir Berkeley
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Morrison, H. (Wilts, Salisbury)
Shepperson, E. W.
Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl


Murchison, C. K.
Skelton, A. N.
Wise, Sir Fredric


Nelson, Sir Frank
Smith, B. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dine, C.)
Wolmer, Viscount


Neville, R. J.
Smith-Carington, Neville W.
Womersley, W. J.


Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)
Smithers, Waldron
Wood, B. C. (Somerset, Bridgwater)


Nicholson, Col. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Ptrsf'ld.)
Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)
Wood, Sir Kingsley (Woolwich, W.).


Nield, Rt. Hon. Sir. Herbert
Spender Clay, Colonel H.
Wood, Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)


Oakley, T.
Sprot, Sir Alexander
Woodcock, Colonel H. C.


O'Neill, Major Rt. Hon. Hugh
Stanley, Col. Hon. G. F. (Will'sden, E.)
Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir. L.


Perkins, Colonel E. K.
Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)
Wragg, Herbert


Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Steel, Major Samuel Strang
Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.


Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)
Storry-Deans, R.



Philipson, Mabel
Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES—




Major Cope and Lord Stanley.


NOES.


Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fife, West)
Hayes, John Henry
Sexton, James


Ammon, Charles George
Henderson, Right Hon. A. (Burnley)
Shiels, Dr. Drummond


Attlee, Clement Richard
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)
Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)


Baker, Walter
Hirst, G. H.
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John


Barker, Q. (Monmouth, Abertillery)
Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)
Sitch, Charles H.


Barnes, A.
Hore-Belisha, Leslie
Slesser, Sir Henry H.


Barr, J.
Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)
Smillie, Robert


Batey, Joseph
Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)
Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)


Beckett, John (Gateshead)
Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)
Smith, H. B. Lees- (Keighley)


Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)
Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Slivertown)
Smith, Rennie (Penistone)


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Snell, Harry


Briant, Frank
Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)
Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip


Bromfield, William
Kelly, W. T.
Spencer, G. A. (Broxtowe)


Bromley, J.
Kennedy, T.
Spoor, Rt. Hon. Benjamin Charles


Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)
Kirkwood, D.
Stamford, T. W.


Buchanan, G.
Lansbury, George
Stephen, Campbell


Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel
Lawson, John James
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)


Charleton, H. C.
Lee, F.
Sutton, J. E.


Clowes, S.
Lowth, T.
Taylor, R. A.


Cluse, W. S.
Lunn, William
Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)


Collins, Sir Godfrey (Greenock)
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)
Thomas, Sir Robert John (Anglesey)


Compton, Joseph
Mackinder, W.
Thomson, Trevelyan (Middlesbro. W.)


Connolly, M.
MacLaren, Andrew
Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)


Davies, Ellis (Denbigh, Denbigh)
March, S.
Thurtle, E.


Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)
Maxton, James
Tinker, John Joseph


Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)
Mitchell, E. Rosslyn (Paisley)
Townend, A. E.


Dennison, R.
Montague, Frederick
Trevelyan, Rt. Hon. C. P.


Evans, Capt. Ernest (Welsh Univer.)
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, N.)
Viant, S. P.


Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.
Naylor, T. E.
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Gibbins, Joseph
Oliver, George Harold
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Gillett, George M.
Owen, Major G.
Welsh, J. C.


Gosling, Harry
Palin, John Henry
Westwood, J.


Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.


Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)
Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.
Wiggins, William Martin


Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)
Potts, John S.
Wilkinson, Ellen C.


Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Purcell, A. A.
Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)


Groves, T.
Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)


Grundy, T. W.
Ritson, J.
Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)


Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)
Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R., Elland)
Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)


Hall, Fredk. (Yorks, Normanton)
Rose, Frank H.
Windsor, Walter


Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)
Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter
Wright, W.


Hamilton, Sir R. (Orkney & Shetland)
Saklatvala, Shapurji
Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)


Hardie, George D.
Salter, Dr. Alfred



Harris, Percy A.
Scrymgeour, E.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Hayday, Arthur
Scurr, John
Mr. Charles Edwards and Mr.




Waine.

Question put accordingly, "That a sum, not exceeding £11,900, be granted for the said Service."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 136; Noes, 254.

Division No. 10.]
AYES
[5.43. p.m.


Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fife, West)
Hayes, John Henry
Shiels, Dr. Drummond


Ammon, Charles George
Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Burnley)
Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)


Attlee, Clement Richard
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir. John


Baker, Walter
Hirst, G. H.
Sitch, Charles H.


Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)
Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)
Slesser, Sir Henry H.


Barnes, A.
Hore-Belisha, Leslie
Smillie, Robert


Barr, J.
Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)
Smith, Bell (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)


Batey, Joseph
Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)
Smith, H. B. Lees- (Keighley)


Beckett, John (Gateshead)
Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)
Smith, Rennie (Penistone)


Benn, Captain Wedgwood (Leith)
Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)
Snell, Harry


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip


Briant, Frank
Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)
Spencer, George A. (Broxtowe)


Bromfield, William
Kelly, W. T.
Spoor, Rt. Hon. Benjamin Charles


Bromley, J.
Kennedy, T.
Stamford, T. W.


Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)
Kirkwood, D.
Stephen, Campbell


Buchanan, G.
Lansbury, George
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)


Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel
Lawson, John James
Sutton, J. E.


Charleton, H. C.
Lee, F.
Taylor, R. A.


Clowes, S.
Lowth, T.
Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)


Cluse, W. S.
Lunn, William
Thomas, Sir Robert John (Anglesey)


Collins, Sir Godfrey (Greenock)
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)
Thomson, Trevelyan (Middlesbro, W.)


Compton, Joseph
Mackinder, W.
Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)


Connolly, M.
MacLaren, Andrew
Thurtle, E.


Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)
March, S.
Tinker, John Joseph


Davies, Ellis (Denbigh, Denbigh)
Maxton, James
Townend, A. E.


Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)
Mitchell, E. Rosslyn (Paisley)
Trevelyan, Rt. Hon. C. P.


Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)
Montague, Frederick
Viant, S. P.


Dennison, R.
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, N.)
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Evans, Capt. Ernest (Welsh Univer.)
Naylor, T. E.
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.
Oliver, George Harold
Welsh, J. C.


Gibbins, Joseph
Owen, Major G.
Westwood, J.


Gillett, George M.
Palin, John Henry
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.


Gosling, Harry
Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)
Wiggins William Martin


Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.
Wilkinson, Ellen C.


Graham, Rt. Hon. Wm. (Edin., Cent.)
Ponsonby, Arthur
Williams, David (Swansea, E.)


Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)
Potts, John S.
Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)


Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)
Purcell, A. A.
Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)


Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)


Groves, T.
Ritson, J.
Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)


Grundy, T. W.
Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R., Elland)
Windsor, Walter


Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)
Rose, Frank H.
Wright, W.


Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)
Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter
Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)


Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)
Saklatvala, Shapurji



Hamilton, Sir R. (Orkney & Shetland)
Salter, Dr. Alfred
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Hardie, George D.
Scrymgeour, E.
Mr. Charles Edwards and Mr.


Harris, Percy A.
Scurr, John
Warne.


Hayday, Arthur
Sexton, James



NOES


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Briggs, J. Harold
Cohen, Major J. Brunel


Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir James T.
Briscoe, Richard George
Colfax, Major Wm. Phillips


Ainsworth, Major Charles
Brittain, Sir Harry
Conway, Sir W. Martin


Alexander, E. E. (Leyton)
Brocklebank, C. E. R.
Cooper, A. Duff


Alexander, Sir Wm. (Glasgow, Cent'l)
Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.
Craig, Capt. Rt. Hon. C. C. (Antrim)


Alien, J. Sandeman (L'pool, W. Derby)
Broun-Lindsay, Major H.
Craig, Ernest (Chester, Crewe)


Astor, Maj. Hon. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Brown, Maj. D. C. (N'th'l'd., Hexham)
Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir Henry


Atkinson, C.
Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Berks, Newb'y)
Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.


Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley
Bullock, Captain M.
Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Burman, J. B.
Crookshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)


Barclay-Harvey, C. M.
Burton, Colonel H. W.
Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Gainsbro)


Barnett, Major Sir R.
Butler, Sir Geoffrey
Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Butt, Sir Alfred
Curzon, Captain Viscount


Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)
Cadogan, Major Hon. Edward
Dalziel, Sir Davison


Bentinck, Lord Henry Cavendish-
Cautley, Sir Henry S.
Davidson, J. (Hertl'd, Hemel Hempst'd)


Berry, Sir George
Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir Evelyn (Aston)
Davidson, Major-General Sir J. H.


Betterton, Henry B.
Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)


Birchall, Major J. Dearman
Chapman, Sir S.
Davies, Sir Thomas (Cirencester)


Blundell, F. N.
Charterls, Brigadier-General J.
Dawson, Sir Philip


Boothby, R. J. G.
Christie, J. A.
Dixey, A. C.


Bourne, Captain Robert Croft.
Churchman, Sir Arthur C.
Dixon, Captain Rt. Hon. Herbert


Bowater, Sir T. Vansittart
Clarry, Reginald George
Eden, Captain Anthony


Bowyer, Capt. G. E. W.
Clayton, G. C.
Elveden, Viscount


Brass, Captain W.
Cobb, Sir Cyril
England, Colonel A.


Brassey, Sir Leonard
Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.
Erskine, James Malcolm Monteith


Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive
Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.
Fairfax, Captain J. G.


Falle, Sir Bertram G.
King, Captain Henry Douglas
Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)


Fanshawe, Commander G. D.
Kinloch-Cooke, Sir Clement
Ropner, Major L.


Fermoy, Lord
Knox, Sir Alfred
Ruggles-Brise, Major E. A.


Fielden, E. B.
Lamb, J. Q.
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)


Forestier-Walker, Sir L.
Lane Fox, Col. Rt. Hon. George R.
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)


Forrest, W.
Lister, Cunliffe., Rt. Hon. Sir. Philip
Sandeman, A. Stewart


Foster, Sir Harry S.
Locker-Lampson, G. (Wood Green)
Sanders, Sir Robert A.


Frece, Sir Walter de
Loder, J. de V.
Sandon, Lord


Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.
Looker, Herbert William
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.


Gadie, Lieut.-Col. Anthony
Lougher, L.
Savery, S. S.


Galbraith, J. F. W.
Lumley, L. R.
Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W. R., Sowerby)


Ganzoni, Sir John
Lynn, Sir Robert J.
Sheffield, Sir Berkeley


Gates, Percy
MacAndrew, Charles Glen
Shepperson, E. W.


Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton
Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)
Skelton, A. N.


Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
Macdonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)
Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dine, C.)


Gilmour, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir John
McDonnell, Colonel Hon. Angus
Smith-Carington, Neville W.


Glyn, Major R. G. C.
MacIntyre, Ian
Smithers, Waldron


Goff, Sir Park
McLean, Major A.
Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)


Gower, Sir Robert
Macmillan Captain H.
Spender Clay, Colonel H.


Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.
Macnaghten, Hon. Sir Malcolm
Sprot, Sir Alexander


Greene, W. P. Crawford
McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John
Stanley, Col. Hon. G. F. (Will'sden, E.)


Gretton, Colonel John
Macquisten, F. A.
Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)


Grotrian, H. Brent
Maitland, Sir Arthur D. steel-
Steel, Major Samuel Strang


Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.
Malone, Major P. B.
Storry-Deans, R.


Gunston, Captain D. W.
Manningham-Buller, Sir Mervyn
Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.


Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry
Margesson, Captain D.
Streatfeild, Captain S. R.


Harland, A.
Marriott, Sir J. A. R.
Tasker, Major R. Inigo


Harrison, G. J. C.
Merriman, F. B.
Thom, Lt.-Col. J. G. (Dumbarton)


Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)
Meyer, Sir Frank
Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)


Haslam, Henry C.
Milne, J. S. Wardlaw-
Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)


Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.
Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)
Titchfield, Major the Marquess of


Henderson, Lieut.-Col. V. L. (Bootle)
Mitchell, Sir W. Lane (Streatham)
Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement


Henn, Sir Sydney H.
Moles, Thomas
Vaughan-Morgan, Col. K. P.


Hennessy, Major J. R. G.
Moore, Lieut,-Colonel T. C. R. (Ayr)
Wallace, Captain D. E.


Herbert, S. (York, N. R., Scar, & Wh'by)
Moore, Sir Newton J.
Ward, Lt.-Col. A. L. (Kingston-on-Hull)


Hills, Major John Walter
Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T. C.
Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.


Hoare, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir. S. J. G.
Moreing, Captain A. H.
Warrender, Sir Victor


Hohler, Sir Gerald Fitzroy
Morrison, H. (Wilts, Salisbury)
Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otley)


Holbrook, Sir Arthur Richard
Murchison, C. K.
Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)


Holland, Sir Arthur
Nelson, Sir Frank
Wells, S. R.


Holt, Capt. H. P.
Neville, R. J.
Wheler, Major Granville C. H.


Homan, C. W. J.
Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)
White, Lieut.-Colonel G. Dalrymple


Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)
Nicholson, Col. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Ptrsf'ld.)
Williams, A. M. (Cornwall, Northern)


Hope, Sir Harry (Forfar)
Nield, Rt. Hon. Sir. Herbert
Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)


Hopkins, J. W. W.
Oakley, T.
Wilson, Sir C. H. (Leeds, Central)


Howard, Captain Hon. Donald
O'Neill, Major Rt. Hon. Hugh
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)
Perkins, Colonel E. K.
Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl


Hudson, R. S. (Cumberl'nd, Whiteh'n)
Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Wise, Sir Fredric


Hume-Williams, Sir W. Ellis
Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)
Wolmer, Viscount


Huntingfield, Lord
Philipson, Mabel
Womersley, W. J.


Hurd, Percy A.
Preston, William
Wood, B. C. (Somerset, Bridgwater)


Iliffe, Sir Edward M.
Price, Major C. W. M.
Wood, Sir Kingsley (Woolwich, W.).


Inskip, Sir Thomas Walker H.
Radford, E. A.
Wood, Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)


Jackson, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. F. S.
Rawson, Sir Alfred Cooper
Woodcock, Colonel H. C.


Jackson, Sir H. (Wandsworth, Cen'l)
Reid, Capt. A. S. C. (Warrington)
Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir. L.


James, Lieut.-Colonel Hon. Cuthbert
Reid, D. D. (County Down)
Wragg, Herbert


Jephcott, A. R.
Remnant, Sir James
Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.


Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)
Richardson, Sir P. W. (Sury, Ch'ts'y)



Kindersiey, Major G. M.
Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—




Major cope and Lord Stanley.


Original Question put accordingly, and agreed to.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: claimed, "That the Original Question be now put."

PUBLIC BUILDINGS, GREAT BRITAIN.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £158,345, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1926, for Expenditure in respect of sundry Public Buildings in Great Britain, not provided for on other Votes, including Historic Buildings, Ancient Monuments, and Brompton Cemetery.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: This is a Supplementary Estimate for expenditure in respect of sundry public buildings in Great Britain not provided for on other Votes, and it includes expenditure, upon historic buildings, ancient monuments, and Brompton Cemetery. Perhaps I had better explain one or two of these items. The sum of £65,000 is asked for in regard to new works, alterations, additions, and purchases for works in progress and proposed works. These items have been asked for and have been rendered necessary because these particular works have progressed more rapidly, but we shall ask for a less sum proportionately in future years for these works. There is
a sum of £10,000 to provide accommodation for coastguards and improvements to existing premises. As hon. Members know, the coastguard stations all round our coast were originally under the Admiralty, but they have now come under the Board of Trade, and they are being used mostly for life-saving purposes. This sum is being asked for in order that the works may be proceeded with more rapidly.
There is a sum of £2,500 for the extension of the Harrow Stationery Office Press, and this extension is required in connection with the printing of the Post Office telephone directory not only for London but for the Provinces. Unless this additional accommodation is provided, I understand that it will not be possible for the directory to be produced within the limits set down by the Post Office. In the year 1924 the telephone directory consisted of 968 pages, but last year it was 1,342 pages. In the previous year the number printed was 231,232, and last year the number printed was 355,500. That shows what an enormous extension of this work has taken place. The actual profit last year was £60,000, and we hope it is going to increase.
There are several technical questions dealt with under Sub-Head B.B., which deals with the repayment of advances under the Land Registry New Buildings Act, 1900. Under the Land Transfer Act of 1899 registration of title of sale was required. At that time the fees used to be sufficient to pay the salaries of the officials and the expenses. Then we got the Land Registry Act of 1900, which authorised the building of the new Land Registry Office. We borrowed the money for this purpose from the National Debt Commissioners, and it is repayable by annuities which are provided under this Vote. Consequently this is merely a book keeping item, and the corresponding amount has to be provided for in this Vote. There is a sum of £9,000 in this Estimate as being the amount required to deal with the fag-end of the programme of maintenance work undertaken during the winter of 1924–25 for the purpose of relieving unemployment, and most of that relief work has been done in connection with ancient monuments.

Mr. J. JONES: The Tory Government.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I have had several proposals from the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. Jones), but this is £9,000 in respect of unemployment relief. We had a programme of relief unemployment work for different parts of the country, and the sums I am asking for now are necessary to carry on those improvements. There is an item of £43,000 for rents, insurance, tithe rent charges, etc. Last year an award was made by the War Compensation Court to the London County Council in respect of Government occupation of the new County Hall and the new Sessions House. That award has taken place since the main Estimate was made out, and we could not say exactly what the amount of that compensation would be. We put aside £21,000 in the original Estimate, but the award was £72,000, and even that was less than the sum which was asked for by the London County Council. That transaction leaves another £43,000 to be voted on this occasion. The new County Hall was occupied by the Ministry of Food during the War, and the Sessions House was occupied by the Ministry of National Service. I think I have now gone through the principal headings, and I have explained what this Vote is for, and if any further questions are asked I will try to answer them. I should like to say that if any very technical questions are asked in regard to any particular legal matters, the Solicitor-General is here to answer them.

Mr. AMMON: I am sure the Committee would like to know what is meant by this expenditure on historic buildings and ancient monuments, and I would also like to know what are our commitments with regard to Brompton Cemetery. We would like to know if there is any interment contemplated in respect of the present Government. I think such a large Supplementary Estimate as this indicates extremely bad budgeting, or it looks as if it might have been deliberately done to give a false impression as to the amount of money that is going to be called for from public funds. When one looks at this expenditure, it does seem that some of it ought to have been foreseen when the original Vote was asked for. Surely it ought to have been possible to have budgeted a little nearer in connection with the acquisition of the
site and erection of hospital buildings at Leeds, in regard to which the cost was under-estimated to the extent of £23,000.
Or is it that, owing to the announcement of the needs and necessities of the Government, rents have been forced up, and a considerably higher sum is now being asked for with reference to these various items. With regard to the next item, relating to accommodation for coastguards, I believe the hon. Gentleman had something to say about that, but I think we have the right to a little further information. It was the policy of the Admiralty—and recently the matter was raised on the Board of Trade Vote—to dispose of this coastguard accommodation around the country, on the ground that, since the coastguards were to be abolished, such cottages would be redundant. Have we sold these cottages and bought them back at an enhanced price, or are we restoring them after it has been intimated to the House that they were not to be used in future? There may be an adequate explanation, but on the face of it it looks something like very bad business indeed. I know it was decided that a number of these cottages should be put up for sale as far back as to years ago. We have a right to know whether any waste of money is going on in that particular direction.
With regard to the Stationery Office premises at Harrow, I gathered from the hon. Gentleman that at any rate some of the printing at this establishment has actually resulted in a profit to the Government, but, surely, the Government ought to have known, or ought to have obtained the information from the Post Office, that the size of the book was going to be increased to this very large extent, and ought not to have had to come here some time later to ask for another £2,500. It does seem as though there were an utter lack of co-ordination and proper business between the Departments in this particular. The Post Office give in their returns a good deal in advance in preparation for the printing of the Directory, and, therefore, as I understood the hon. Gentleman to say that this sum was mostly required in connection with the enlargement of the Post Office Telephone Directory, I think we ought to have had much closer budgeting at the time when
the original Estimates were presented. We see from the next Vote that a part of the money was asked for, but was dropped at a later stage. I do not want to prolong the discussion on these matters, but I should like to put these questions on the items to which I have referred, again reminding the hon. Gentleman that we would like some information as to what are the historic buildings and ancient monuments referred to, and particularly what are our commitments with regard to Brompton Cemetery.

Sir F. WISE: There is one point that the Under-Secretary has not mentioned, namely, Sub-head. K, "Furniture." I should think my hon. Friend is tired of furniture by now, but no details are mentioned here, and if one looks at the original Estimate one finds that for the year 1925–26 the expenditure for furniture was £81,760, which is now increased by the Supplementary Vote to £87,760. I really think we should have an explanation with regard to this furniture. We have had three or four different Votes, and each Vote has shown an increase in regard to furniture. Perhaps my hon. Friend will be able to explain in more detail.

Captain W. BENN: I should like to refer to Sub-head CC, "Unemployment Relief Works." Reference has been made to the advantage of putting work in hand for the relief of unemployment, and this is the second of these items that we have had this afternoon, while a third and a fourth will be coming on in subsequent Estimates. I want to ask the hon. Gentleman one or two questions about this matter, not with the view of complaining of the amount, but rather of suggesting that the policy of the Government is wrong in reference to these items relating to unemployment. We know quite well that, where it is possible to put in hand or accelerate public work with a view to giving employment, it is a good thing, but the difficulty that has been found by many public authorities, in trying to find work and give men employment, has been that they could not find profitable, useful and necessary work. In each Government Department, however, it is possible to find something which must be done and which may be put in hand at once and so absorb some workers,
but the policy of the Government, as far as one can understand, is the exact reverse of that. They have not only told the Unemployment Grants Committee that they must cut down the grants to local authorities, but in the various Departments they have themselves, in these Estimates, reduced very drastically the allowances for this purpose.
This Vote is a very strong case in point. On page 75 of the original Estimate it will be seen that, as against a grant of £99,000 for last year, the figure for the present year is only £16,000, and the Government are forced to come forward now and ask for an additional £9,000. I think they would have been better advised to make the item larger in the first instance, in view of the needs of people who are looking for work. Further, the £9,000 appears not to be in respect of any work put in hand this winter, when work is needed, but in respect of a remnant of some work left over from last year. In connection with this item, I suggest that the policy of the Government in all these Departments is lacking in sympathy and wisdom, and that they would have been better advised in each Department to see whether they could do what was recommended at the time of the Ministry of Reconstruction, namely, to see whether it was not possible in each Department to accelerate work and absorb men at their own jobs, and so keep them off the unemployment register.

Miss WILKINSON: I want again to refer to the question of furniture, because the replies which have been given to previous questions on this subject were profoundly unsatisfactory to many on this side, and, I am sure, on the other side also. I want, first of all, to make it clear that I am not criticising the amount that is being spent on furniture. My experience of the Government offices with which I have been in contact is that, with the exception of the offices reserved for the chiefs of Departments and their immediate assistants, most Government offices could do with refurnishing from top to bottom. Anything more dreary, dull and soul-killing than the average office in which the Government of the day expects its employés to work would be very hard to find, and, therefore, any amount that the Govern- 
ment bring in in order to provide clean, new furniture for their unfortunate employés will, I am sure, be warmly welcomed on this side of the Committee.
Where I want to criticise the hon. Gentleman is in regard to the reply given on a previous Estimate to the effect that none of this money was being spent on furniture that had been made by disabled ex-soldiers and sailors. Some of us have been connected with various Committees dealing with the employment of disabled ex-service men, and we know, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman himself knows, that the great difficulty in connection with finding employment for these men is the disposal of the product when it is made without interfering with the ordinary channels of trade. Furniture, I submit, and especially Government furniture would form a very useful outlet for the work of these men. We know that St. Dunstan's have a large factory where disabled men are employed in making furniture, and there are other agencies at work also. We regret that this matter has to be left to voluntary endeavour, and we feel that it would be much better if it were directly encouraged by the Government. We have now had Divisions on three Votes, and if one adds up the total amount one finds that we have already voted £41,000. These are only Supplementary Estimates, so that when we add this amount to the original Estimate, together with the Votes that have yet to be taken on furniture, it is going to be a very respectable sum. I submit that if the Government were facing this question of the employment of disabled ex-service men they would see that such a huge capital sum as is being spent on furniture would form a whole channel of employment and training for disabled ex-service men. I want to submit to the hon. Gentleman and to the Government that, while a considerable amount of money was spent just immediately after the War, when the wounds of these men were fresh in our memory, in seeing what channels of employment could be found for them—

Sir JOHN MARRIOTT: On a point Order. We are all in sympathy with what the hon. Member is saying, but shall we be entitled to discuss, on this Vote, the policy in regard to the employment of ex-service men?

Colonel GRETTON: On that point of Order. May I submit for your consideration, Captain FitzRoy, that the decision as to how furniture is to be provided lies with the Office of Works?

Miss WILKINSON: I understand that the Office of Works is the Department with which we are dealing, and I would, therefore, submit respectfully that I am in order in discussing the question of the policy of the Office of Works

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Captain FitzRoy): I do not think the hon. Member is strictly in order in dealing with the question whether the furniture should be made by ex-service men. The question is simply one of how much it should cost, and whether any economy could be effected when the contracts are made. It would not be in order to pursue at any length the subject of the employment of ex-service men in making furniture. I see no objection to its being referred to quite shortly, but it must not be made the subject of a Debate.

Mr. SPENCER: On a point of Order. May I respectfully submit that, if it can be shown that by purchasing furniture from the ex-service men it would be obtained more cheaply, we should be able to discuss it?

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: That could be discussed on the main Estimate—on the question of policy.

Mr. SPENCER: I am not raising the question of policy, but, if it can be shown that the cost of the furniture, if it were purchased from the ex-service men, would be less, could not that be raised on this Vote?

The DEPUTY - CHAIRMAN: If it could be shown that the amount required in the Supplementary Estimate would have been less, that would be in order, but a discussion on policy would not be in order.

Miss WILKINSON: I certainly bow to your ruling, and thank you for your permission to raise the matter, even though it may not form the subject of a Debate. It is merely because I desire to ventilate the matter that I am raising it in this way. Following your reply on the previous point of Order, I would like to ask the hon. Gentleman if he would go into
this matter of cost, and if he would consider whether it would not be possible to get this furniture much more cheaply from the organisations in question than through the ordinary channels, bearing in mind that., when I say "more cheaply," I am not only considering the matter of the actual cost, but the other savings that might be effected if the amount spent on furniture were considered in relation to the amount spent by other Departments in connection with ex-service men. Although an actual reduction in other parts of this amount, and in the other amounts that are to be added today, might not be secured, yet it is to be borne in mind that direct labour is generally cheaper, as there is no manufacturer's profit, and there is also the intangible reduction due to the finding of employment for these men; and it seems to me that, with the possibility of reductions of grants in other directions, a very considerable saving might be effected in this way. Accordingly, I submit these suggestions to the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. HARRIS: I want to divert the Committee to B.B. of this Vote, particularly as we have the advantage of having both the Law Officers of the Crown—a very exceptional event on which the Committee is to be congratulated. As far as I can understand, there is a saving of some £43,000 on the Department of the Land Registry. So efficient has that organisation been, so well has their work been done, that they have been able to save £43,000. It looks to me as if many of the Departments would be far better run if they were taken over and controlled by the Law Officers. They show exceptional business capacity. Instead of having to come and ask for Supplementary Votes, they are able to tell us they have made a clear saving. The way the money is to be allocated, however, is rather peculiar. The statement at the end of the Report suggests that it is to be used to educe the cost of the building—to wipe out the capital cost of the original charge. At a time like this, when we are heavily taxed, it seems rather unnecessary to make this provision for future generations. The building will be there—it is well built—and I cannot help thinking this amount might be much better utilised in the direction of a reduction of taxation, if it is within the law to allow that.
Might I also ask if it is correct that fees are to be reduced? As I understand it, a new scale of fees comes into operation this year and there will not be that large surplus next year. I really got up to congratulate the Law Officers on the very successful year's trading of this very useful Department. At the time of its inception it was prophesied that it would be a heavy charge on the State. It shows that land registration now is on a sound basis, that the people in charge of it are running it economically, and that it would not be a bad thing to spread these institutions all over the country, so that it would facilitate land transfer and make the exchange of property much simpler, because now it has been proved, in the light of a good many years' experience, that a Department can be run by the State on economical lines.

Mr. REMER: I rise to draw attention once again to the very expensive amount which appears in these continual Estimates under the head of "Furniture." It cannot be done too often. I have one question particularly to ask. Is the furniture which is supplied to these Departments made within the British Islands or otherwise? That question was asked last night, and it has not been answered within my hearing. I should like particularly to reply to the speech of the hon. Member for East Middlesbrough (Miss Wilkinson). I and others have the fullest sympathy with finding employment for disabled people, but there are disabled people who are employed by the furniture manufacturers, and, to my knowledge, a great many of them are at present working short time.

Sir GERALD HOHLER: On a point of Order. I understand we are being asked only to grant an additional sum. Surely my hon. Friend is raising a matter of policy, which ought to be raised on the original Vote. The Government have put certain work in hand and they require more money to complete it. I submit that this question, which is apparently raised only in order to waste time—

Mr. LANSBURY: On a point of Order. Is it in order for an hon. and learned Gentleman to make an accusation against his colleagues?

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: The hon. and learned Gentleman should not rise to a point of Order, and then attribute motives. I have given a ruling at considerable length on this question of furniture, and the employment of ex-service men. It must not be made the subject of debate. With regard to the question of furniture, it does not play so large a part on this Estimate as it did on the last. On the last Estimate, the additional sum required was very much larger even than the original sum. On this Estimate, it forms a very small fraction of the original sum required, and therefore does not constitute a subject on which so much debate should take place.

Mr. REMER: The hon. Member for East Middlesbrough spoke at considerable length, and put forward a particular point of view. Are we not to have the opportunity of replying to her arguments?

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN: I intervened while the hon. Member for East Middlesbrough was speaking and told her it must not be made the subject of debate.

Mr. REMER: I feel very strongly that these items should be scrutinised in the closest detail. The Government have not made out their case for the large amount for which they are asking, and we are entitled to some further explanation. I cannot see my war on this occasion to support the Government. I have not voted against them on any Supplementary Estimate up to the moment. I feel bound to enter my protest against these continual large sums, which they bring forward in the only possible way, by voting against them. I am sorry to do so, but it is only by that means that we can bring home to them that we of the Conservative party really stand for a policy of the strictest economy. For that reason, I shall have no hesitation in registering my vote in the only way it is possible to do so.

Mr. CHARLETON: I have been considerably surprised to find that the item that relates to the erection of hospital buildings at Leeds is being persisted in. Subsequent to the main Estimates being presented, the Ministry was closing a hospital at Leeds, and all the patients and the people affected protested against it and the whole of the Members for
Leeds, on both sides of the House, went, as a deputation, to ask the Minister to retain the hospital. But it was decided to close it. Yet this hospital is being persisted in at a cost of £132,000. The hospital that was closed was a free gift from a public-spirited gentleman to the nation. It was rejected by the Ministry, and, to my surprise, they are persisting in building this new hospital. I should like to ask whether consideration has been given to what has been presented by the Seclect Committee on Estimates. They say:
In regard to hospital treatment, the policy of the Ministry is to rely mainly upon Ministry of Pensions hospitals. The question of utilising on the one hand military and naval hospitals and on the other ordinary civil hospitals has, we understand, been carefully considered, but, in our opinion, insufficiently.
This was prior to the Estimates of last year. They go on to say that there are 36 hospitals. Further, it was brought out in evidence before the Committee that in 1921 there were 67 extra hospitals, and on 1st April, 1924, they were reduced to 36. One is entitled to assume that from 1st April to the present day we are requirng fewer hospitals than we did, and we ought to know why we are persisting in spending this £132,000.

Mr. TREVELYAN THOMSON: I wish to support the contention put forward by the last speaker in regard to Sub-head C.C. As the Minister said, the Committee will not censure him for the excess of £9,000 in the Supplementary Estimate, but rather for the loose estimating of the original sum, because the original Estimate was for £16,440, whereas in the previous year the sum of £99,860 had been spent. When we have regard to the fact that this was to serve as a palliative for unemployment and to accelerate work put in hand during a period of distress, and that the prospect for this year is no better, so far as unemployment is concerned, than last year, it seems extraordinary that there should have been this reduction in the amount. It would have been creditable to the Minister if he had shown a larger excess on this item because, as he told us, this work of restoring ancient monuments, which we have seen going on throughout the country, is a valuable national work, and surely at a time when unemployment is so severe it should have been the duty of a
Government Department to increase rather than diminish the number of men employed in that line. The Minister has told us that this was the fag-end of the programme of 1924–25. Apparently, no new work was put in hand during this part of the year, when unemployment was so bad. Instead of diminishing the amount of work and simply clearing off the fagend of a programme, one would have thought that the Government, if it had proper sympathy, would have increased the amount of work of this character. Criticisms of relief work are made frequently on the ground that it is of an unnecessary kind, but it cannot be said with regard to work of this character. I hope that when the Minister replies, he will give us an assurance that the Government will stop the policy of curtailing this class of work, and that they will encourage work of this kind, so long as unemployment remains as bad as it is.

Colonel GRETTON: I propose to raise several points on items which have not been mentioned. With regard to Item "A", at the end of the account, there is the restoration of a portion of the deduction of £50,000 made from the original Estimate for works, £29,500. There is a similar Item, "C," in which the original Estimate provided for a reduction in respect of the cost of services, and now it apears that the reduction was illusory and that a sum of £23,000 is required on account of maintenance and repair of buildings. The total of these two items is £52,5,00. In connection with these items a new method has, I think, been adopted. Hitherto we have always had an account given of the items for which excess payments are required. It is now put in this way, that on the whole amount there has been some miscalculation, that the. Government have been trying to make reductions, and that there must be some extra charge made in the form of a Supplementary Estimate. The Committee has no information on the expenditure of £29,500 under Item "A," nor has it any explanation of the further £23,000 required under Item "C." This is an abuse of the practice of presenting Votes.
We have reason to complain of the course that is being taken by the Treasury in this matter. I do not suppose the Office of Works is primarily responsible for the form in which the Vote is sub-
mitted. We ought to be informed on what items these excess expenditures have been incurred, and we ought not to pass, except with the utmost reluctance and only after strong protest, a Vote of this kind. I hope the Minister will be able to give some explanation as to why this has been done. I hope he has in his possession some details of how these amounts are made up. I am afraid that some of us who are anxious that the House of Commons should keep control over public expenditure, must push this matter as far as we are able. It is a very serious case.
In other items on this Vote, no doubt there has been reason for some miscalculation. The Estimates have been made up very closely. The Estimates are made out by the Department at the beginning of each calendar year, and they are printed and usually submitted to the House in March or April. We are now considering these Supplementary Estimates in February. It is reasonable that some adjustments should be necessary. Hitherto the Departments have been able, unless there have been large unexpected items which could not possibly be estimated, to make adjustments. If a Department wanted to spend more money in one direction it has usually been able to save on some other item. That is the proper course. It is trying to delude the House of Commons to put in Estimates at the commencement of the financial year, and then to adopt this new practice, of which I complain, and to say: "We have made reductions. We reduced our Estimates at the commencement of the financial year, but now we must restore some of the reductions," without giving any explanation of the items on which the Estimates have been exceeded. I desire to press this point very strongly on the attention of the Government, because it is an abuse of our recognised practice.
I hope the Minister will be able to give some explanation of the deficiency in the Appropriations-in-Aid, which amounts to £17,000. These Appropriations-in-Aid were expected to reduce the Vote, but they have failed to that extent. How has that deficiency occurred, and under what heads? It is claimed that there has been a profit of £60,000 at the Harrow printing works in connection with the
printing of the Telephone Directory, instead of putting that work out to private contract. There has been an inquiry into the matter, with which I had nothing to do. I must warn the Committee against accepting the figure that is here given. In some cases Estimates of this kind are made from the experience of many years past. A report will be issued shortly which will put a somewhat different complexion upon the Estimates which are put forward and mentioned rather loosely in this House. No doubt the Government does a great deal of printing at these works and at very reasonable cost, but to say that they have made profit to that amount on any particular printing, which would justify further expenditure in machinery requires very much closer investigation than this Committee is able to give. The Government have spent £32,800 on machinery and plant and £100 on furniture, and another £2,500 is required. That may or may not be justified. The putting in of plant and machinery means that you have an asset for your money and something to show that you are doing work for the State, and I am not prepared to quarrel with that particular item. I wish, however, to press most seriously the other matters.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL (Sir Douglas Hogg): There are two items in this Vote which affect me and which have been commented upon. In regard to Item BB of £43,000, that is not an extra expenditure, but a profit. What has happened is that under the more careful administration of the Land Registry Department and the larger use that has been made of it, it has proved possible to realise on the year's working £43,145 profit. Under the Land Registry Act of 1897, which constituted the Land Registry, the Statute forbids any profit being made out of the working of the Land Registry. A profit having been made, the only way is to use that money for land registry expenditure, and the most economical way of using it, as far as we could see, was in paying off to that extent the capital expenditure which has been incurred in the Land Registry buildings. It is not possible to apply that money to the reduction of taxation, as suggested by the hon. Member for Bethnal Green (Mr. Harris) because the Act of Parliament forbids that being done. As a result of that profit, the
fees have been reduced as from the 1st January this year. It is impossible to tell with exactness what the result of the working under the new Property Act will be, but a substantial reduction has been made in the cost to the public. Therefore, we hope that, in spite of that fact, the Land Registry will continue to pay its way. The money in question is the realised profit on the year ending March, 1925, and paid into the Exchequer, and it will be used, with the sanction of this Committee, in paying off the capital debt on the Land Registry buildings.
Item "F," £43,000, concerns me, in that I happened to take part in the litigation represented in that result. It is complained that we are spending a great deal too much in that regard. It so happens that the original claim was for £1,545,000 by the London County Council. I represented the Crown in connection with the claim, and, when the case had lasted for some hours, I was able to effect a settlement of the whole claim, for £73,000, a saving of £1,473,000. I do not think that was a result of which I had any cause to be ashamed. That settlement having been effected, it becomes necessary to provide the sum required to make up the amount payable to the County Council beyond that put in the original Estimate of £30,000. Therefore, a further sum of £42,000 is required. I do not think that either of these two items are items in respect of which it can be said that the Government have neglected the cause of economy, or that they have not had close regard to national expenditure. Although I entirely sympathise with the zeal for economy which my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Remer) displayed—I am sorry he is not in his place—I think the occasion for his display might have been more appropriately chosen. I can assure him and any other hon. Members who are anxious to promote economy and to support it by their votes, that they will have plenty of opportunities before many weeks are over of making good their desire.

7.0 P.M.

Mr. ELLIS DAVIES: The right hon. and learned Gentleman has referred to profit that has been made. I find a profit of £72,000 last year, and there is also a figure of £43,145 this year. In all, there is a profit of £115,000, in two years.
I think it is necessary to recall that the Land Registry was established to facilitate and cheapen the transfer of land. On the other hand, apparently what has, taken place is that the sum of £115,000 has been taken by way of indirect tax from the owners during two years by charging too high fees, an indirect tax on landowners. It is quite true, as the learned Attorncy-General said, that a reduction has taken place in fees. But may I put this question to him: What is the total amount of fees received during the year by the Registry? We might, in that case, ascertain to what extent the property-owners of this country have been indirectly taxed.

Mr. H. WILLIAMS: Supplementary Estimates have only one merit. They are the only opportunity that the private Member has to consider expenditure in detail, because when we consider the main Estimates, we discuss, really, our policy of administration rather than consider the items of expenditure in the way that we are discussing them to-night I want to take some exception to the point of view urged by0 the hon. Member for West Middlesbrough (Mr. T. Thomson), to prevent any misunderstanding. He urged that there should be no reduction of this class of expenditure, on the ground that unemployment was bad, but, as in the main the classes of expenditure which we are considering to-night affect the building trade and ancillary trades, and as there is already a difficulty in obtaining in some towns at any rate, adequate labour, I think he can hardly put forward an argument that will appeal to the majority of this Committee, when he urges that this class of expenditure should not be cut down.
I want, very briefly, to reinforce—though it hardly needs it—the arguments of the hon. and gallant Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) in regard to Items A and C. It may be, of course, that there is an explanation, that all that has happened, particularly in the case of Item A, is that certain works that have been sanctioned, it may be last year, or the year before, and which will take some years to complete, are making more rapid progress than was anticipated, and, therefore, that £29,500 of expenditure, which has got to be met anyhow, is falling in the present financial year instead of the coming financial year. If that be the
case, of course, we cannot reasonably object to that item.
With regard to the other, I am not clear that it is in the same category. Item C, as I read the somewhat inadequate note that appears on the paper, looks like new expenditure. It looks as if certain Departments of State have spent rather more in reinstatement than was originally contemplated. I think we ought to be furnished with rather more definite information than we are getting, in order that we can find out whether really by voting this sum of £23,000 we are authorising the Office of Works to spend money which might be avoided, if there had been more careful economy.
While I deplore Supplementary Estimates as a whole, I do not think in the main that this particular one is open to as much criticism as some of the others, because the two items which the learned Attorney-General has just explained are items we cannot really argue about. One is merely a book transfer, and the other is a claim in respect of things which happened seven years ago. It does not infer any extravagance to-day. I think we ought to have a little more explanation in regard to the last item in A and Item C.

Mr. MARCH: There are one or two items I would like to put to the Minister in connection with this Vote which have not been spoken of by any Member to-day. One is that of removals. It seems to me to be a bit strange that the Office of Works is not able to estimate its requirements for removals during a year by nearly one-half. We had in the other Vote a question with regard to removals of £1,000. In connection with this Estimate, we have £4,000, and the original Estimate was £9,100. It seems to me very strange that all this discrepancy should arise in regard to removals. I want to know exactly how it occurs. It may occur because of the lack of the Office of Works and the Government generally in providing their own vehicles and their own men in doing their work by direct labour. I often see a number of pantechnicons for the Office of Works, from contractors, standing about in various places, and I think it is nearly time this was redundant, and that the Office of Works did its own removals, and also had its own vehicles more up to date.
Then, in connection with Item C, I see it says, "Maintenance and repair" of certain buildings that, were used during the War. As one travels about, one sees a number of buildings still being pulled down. Take the Embankment, for instance. Only a few months ago the Office of Works were demolishing some buildings, pretty close where they are putting up some new ones now. It seems a bit difficult to know why it was that they pulled the two buildings down there, which took some considerable time—I am sure they were well constructed—and are now going on building in the same spot, putting up buildings of a similar kind. I admit they are a bit stronger, and also a bit larger, because they are putting a second floor on, where there was only one in the other buildings. But surely something could be done in the way of making them substantial, in order to enable the Ministry to carry on its work without doing as it is doing now? I am also wondering if the buildings which the Office of Works put up in the East India Dock Road, near by the Iron Bridge, for the Ministry of Labour, have any connection with this Office of Works Vote. I know that the Office of Works did the work, and it is quite possible it is in this Estimate. But when I asked a question—

The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is speaking of new buildings. These items refer to buildings which were occupied for War services.

Mr. MARCH: Yes, but this comes under the other one "New Works and Alterations."

The CHAIRMAN: I beg the hon. Member's pardon.

Mr. MARCH: This work was added to the old building in East India Dock Road, for the Employment Exchange. If you saw the number of men standing about day after day, you would name it rather the Unemployment Exchange. I am certain there is no accommodation for the men who are outside; they have to go in a few at a time, in order to get to the counter. When I put down a question asking why they were doing that, considering that the Government claims such a big reduction in the number of people unemployed—

Captain CROOKSHANK: On a point of Order. Is the hon. Member really
entitled to speak on this matter? Do not we only have mention of work referred to in the Sub-paragraph of Item A? That is the only work in progress mentioned on this Estimate.

The CHAIRMAN: There is an item for £29,500 for restoration of anticipated deductions. If none of this money is to go to this work in the East India Dock Road, then that would not be in order.

Mr. MARCH: I am quite, certain that the Office of Works did this work, and I do not suppose they did it without wanting some money, or someone who did it wanting some money, for it. I want to ask why it was essential to put this building up when the Government are claiming that there is such a big reduction in the number of unemployed. I was informed that, in this particular district, they were not getting the number of unemployed they had expected they would. I was wondering whether the Government were going to bring all the Poplar registration to that one place, or whether they were still going to continue sending the Poplar people to Limehouse, Stratford, Victoria Park, and Hackney to register. If the Government are going to have this one registration, then we can understand why they extended the building, but up to the moment all that we can find out is that they have been cutting the men off, even though they said there would not be the number as anticipated there would be, on the unemployed register there. During the last three months you have cut off no less than 1,500 people from benefit in the Poplar district. If you are going to cut them off to that extent, you will not want any buildings at all. It does seem to me that you have wasted a good deal of money in putting up this building alongside the other one in the East India Dock Road, unless you make better use than is being made of it at the present time.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I should like to reply to some of the questions which have been put. In the first place, my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) made rather a severe attack upon the Government in regard to what we may call the restoration sum of £29,500, and the sum of £23,000 for maintenance. I do not think he would have done so if he had been in the House yesterday when I did
my best to explain what these restorations were. In the original Estimates we made—I think my hon. Friend the Member for Reading (Mr. II. Williams) was in the House when I explained—we made a deduction. Although the House gave full assent to our full programme, we made a deduction, in this case of £50,000, at the request of the Treasury. We anticipated that possibly there would be some delays in carrying out the work. As a matter of fact, the whole of these delays did not occur, and therefore this sum of £29,000 is merely a restoration of the cut that was made.

Colonel GRETTON: Can the hon. Gentleman tell the Committee what particular works entailed a larger expenditure than was anticipated.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: That is a question which was asked yesterday, and we had rather a long Debate about it. It is quite impossible to give details without reprinting the whole of the main Estimates. This sum is arrived at, because, in the cases where there was delay, we did not actually spend the amount we had estimated by quite a large sum. In other cases, it was exactly the opposite. This sum is spread over the whole of the main Estimates. In order to show exactly how it is made up one would have to reprint the whole of the main Estimates and to give the exact figures.

Colonel GRETTON: That is exactly what I heard my hon. Friend say yesterday. The Government is in reality asking for a block vote without giving any details.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I have no doubt it is possible to get the information, but I have not got it here. If the information were available, I would have to read out a long list of items in regard to which delays have not occurred, and I am sure the Committee does not want to hear that.

Mr. LANSBURY: We do.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: One hon. Member made a protest against the increase of £23,000 on "maintenance." Though not exactly on all fours with it, that is very similar to what I have just explained. We were asked by the Treasury to cut down our Estimate by £20,000, and we did so. Since then we
have found it necessary to spend a good deal more. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) thinks it would be much better to overestimate than to have these Supplementary Estimates. In the second Report of the Public Accounts Committee of last year there is a paragraph approving of this very system of making cuts, and, if necessary, restoring sums that are required thereafter. Among other questions I was asked by an hon. Member something about the Brompton Cemetery. That is not included in this Vote. I was also asked about the building in the East India Dock Road. That is not included in this Vote.
With regard to monuments, I was asked what were the monuments on which unemployed labour had been used? I have a list of them here. One is Dunfermline Abbey, another Linlithgow Palace, and there are several others. On this question of unemployment relief it is true that the sum for which we are asking is for the fag-end of the programme of 1924–25. There is nothing down in the Estimate for the 1925–26 winter. Under the item for "maintenance," in which there is an increase of £23,000, the Office of Works have taken great care to do what they could to absorb as much unemployed labour as possible. Therefore, although the money is specifically down in the Vote for the 1925–26 winter, we have managed under another subhead to give a great deal of work to the unemployed.
The hon. Member for East Middlesbrough (Miss Wilkinson) asked a question about disabled men, and the same question was raised by the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Remer). In a previous answer I was not quite accurate. I said that although I had a great deal of sympathy with what was stated regarding disabled men, I did not know that disabled men were employed on making furniture for the Office of Works, but that I would look into it, and that I thought we ought to do what we could to give a certain amount of employment to disabled men. I have had time to make inquiries, and I find that the factories which employ disabled ex-service men are invited always to tender for furniture and that they have received already from the Office of Works several contracts for furniture.

Miss WILKINSON: Is it the custom of the Office of Works always to accept the lowest tender, or are other circumstances taken into consideration?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: The hon. Member may take it as certain that, all other circumstances being equal, the ex-service men's tender will have the preference. We do not take the lowest tender necessarily, for we have to consider what sort of firm it is that tenders. All the firms which are employed in making the furniture are on the King's Roll, and, therefore, you always get the employment of some disabled men. Regarding the hospital at Leeds, my reply is that the present huts are required by the education authority of Leeds. They have been pressing us over and over again for the release of the premises, and that is the reason for the construction of a hospital at Leeds. It was the Labour Government which started this scheme and came to the decision that this hospital should be built.

Mr. R. RICHARDSON: What my hon. Friend wanted to know was why the Government were erecting a building when a hospital had been given by a number of public-spirited gentlemen?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: As I have said, the education authority was pressing us for the surrender of these huts.

Mr. MARCH: Will the hon. Gentleman explain how it is that the "removals" item has increased by £4,000, as against the £9,000 estimated?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: That increase is owing to the fact that since the main Estimates were passed a part of the Air Ministry's staff has been moved from Kingsway to Gwydyr House. Also, since the main Estimates were passed some of the telephone staff have been removed.

Mr. SCURR: I beg to move to reduce the Vote by £100.
Although throughout the Debate we have received perfect courtesy from the Minister in charge, who in every sense of the word does his best to give us explanations, yet I suggest that he is in a most invidious position in not being really representative of the Department concerned. This is a spending Department, which spends very large sums of money, and the Minister really respon-
sible is in another place. The consequence is that we are unable to meet that Minister face to face in order to criticise his actions or make him justify his policy. We cannot expect the hon. Gentleman opposite, who has just left the Under-Secretaryship at the Home Office and undertaken the important work of the Foreign Office, to be able to follow all the details of these Estimates. I join with the hon. and gallant Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) and the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Remer) in protesting at the growing practice of presenting Supplementary Estimates.
We are getting into a position in which the Executive is getting right away from the control of the House of Commons. The House of Commons, if it is to exist as an institution at all, must retain control of the sources of revenue and supply. We must be able to criticise the Executive, and to determine its policy by reason of our control over finance. But Governments simply come forward with their Estimates, which cannot be adequately discussed by this House, and we know that at the end of the number of days allotted to Supply we shall march through the Lobbies, one on this side and one on that, voting away money without having had an oportunity of discussion.

The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is now raising a large constitutional issue. He is in order in moving a reduction of the Vote on the ground that in the present instance there is not in the House a direct representative of the Department, and I will accept such an Amendment; but he cannot raise the larger constitutional question on a Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. SCURR: Surely the point is that when these Supplementary Estimates are so constantly presented to us the House of Commons is losing its control over finance. Am I not entitled, on any of the Supplementary Estimates, to raise that very important issue? If you rule against me, I will proceed with other points that I wish to raise.

The CHAIRMAN: The hon. Member is raising an alarming vista of arguments which may be produced. He is quite entitled to comment on the fact that the
hon. Member in charge of the Votes does not directly represent the Department concerned.

Captain BENN: Would you kindly indicate what would be a suitable opportunity of raising the general question of the impropriety of Supplementary Estimates?

The CHAIRMAN: If any hon. Gentleman succeeded in getting a place in the ballot, he could move on going into Committee of Supply on the Civil Service Estimates.

Captain BENN: There are no Supplementary Estimates in existence on that occasion, and the Government would no doubt stoutly assert then that there will be no Supplementary Estimates. Therefore, that is not a suitable occasion.

The CHAIRMAN: The hon. and gallant Member will be able to point to the experience of the past.

Mr. SCURR: The hon. Gentleman in charge of the Estimates has not given any reply to the question raised by the hon. and gallant Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) in relation to the Appropriations-in-Aid. The anticipated deficit on the original Estimate is £17,000 and when I look at the original Estimate I find that for 1924–25 admission fees to the Tower of London, the Armouries, Carnarvon Castle, etc., were estimated to produce £18,700, but for 1925–26 they were estimated to produce £30,000. That was an estimated increase in these receipts of £11,300, but here we have a statement that the deficit on the original estimate is £17,000. Are we to understand that there was no actual basis for that estimated increase in fees? I do not live far from the Tower of London and I have not heard of any great increase in public interest in the Tower which would lead to an increase of receipts, and I have not heard that the rates charged are any higher than formerly. Therefore, there seems to be here something which amounts almost to deceptive estimating—if I may use that expression. It would seem that in order to get large apparent Appropriations-in-Aid these Estimates have been presented in this way, and now when we have a deficit of £17,000 it is made to appear that the Tower of London is responsible for it. The Government have placed the First Commissioner of Works, who ought to be responsible to us
for these Estimates, in another place, and for these reasons I beg to move the reduction.

Sir ELLIS HUME - WILLIAMS: I desire to ask a question on the well-worn subject of furniture. I observe that the heading under which the furniture item occurs is "Public Buildings, … including Historic Buildings, Ancient Monuments and Brompton Cemetery." The hon. Gentleman has detailed some of the historic buildings, most of which are ancient and beautiful ruins, and I do not think the furniture can be going there. I have never heard of anybody who wanted to furnish an ancient monument, and I am afraid that in the course of years we ourselves will furnish Brompton Cemetery—so that one would like to know for what this furniture is intended?

Mr. W. BAKER: I feel that the Committee will be in agreement with the Public Accounts Committee in advocating the system of restoring deductions rather than the method of over-estimating. But what we complain of here is that, in restoring deductions made from previous Estimates, the Department is not giving us sufficient information. I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Mile End (Mr. Scurr) has called attention to the position in connection with the Tower of London, because I feel that had it not been for his speech that matter would not have been clear to the Committee. As regards the hospital at Leeds, I understand the total estimated cost is £132,000, and the cost up to date is £88,000. The amount asked for in the Supplementary Estimate is £23,000. Can The hon. Gentleman say when will the hospital be completed and whether there is any reasonable prospect that the Estimates, to be laid before the House shortly, will enable the Ministry of Pensions to finish that work? In regard to the item, "Provision of accommodation for coastguards and improvements to existing premises as required," my difficulty is that, while £10,000 is asked for in the Supplementary Estimate, we have been unable to ascertain the total sum required in the original Estimate and in the Supplementary Estimate.
Under the heading of the "Harrow Stationery Office Press," we are asked for £32,800 for extensions. I understood
the hon. Gentleman to say that this was a continuation of work previously undertaken, but I have carefully hunted through the original Estimate and I am unable to find the item. In those circumstances I cannot settle in my own mind whether this work has been commenced and has progressed almost to the point of completion, or whether this is an entirely new item for which we are asked to make a first contribution of £2,500 in this Estimate. Under the heading of "Maintenance and Repair of Public Offices" we are told that the original Estimate provided for a reduction in respect of the cost of services which might not arise during the year and that the expectation was not realised. The hon. Gentleman should do the Committee the courtesy of explaining what grounds existed for that expectation and what causes led to the expectation not being realised. In the course of yesterday's Debate I asked the Minister whether his Department had substituted oil fuel for coal, and I understood him to give an emphatic denial. As I explained at the time, I was inclined to congratulate him upon the change. All I seek is to know the exact facts with regard to this matter.

The CHAIRMAN: Under what item does this point arise?

Mr. BAKER: It arises in Section "R."

The CHAIRMAN: I cannot find any Section "R" in this Estimate.

Mr. BAKER: I may be mistaken in thinking that Section "R" appears in the Supplementary Estimate, but it certainly appeared in the original Estimate, and I thought it was carried into the present Estimate. If, however, I am mistaken, I can put this interesting point to the hon. Gentleman on another occasion.

Major KINDERSLEY: Under Subhead "A II" I find a note relating to an expenditure of £29,500 to the effect that this is a restoration of portion of the deduction of £50,000 from the original Estimate in respect of works which may or may not be carried out during the year, and The hon. Gentleman has told us that there have been some savings in some cases, while there has been over-spending in others, and that in the result the total of £29,500 mentioned is required. No doubt, these savings and the over-spend-
ing have been in regard to particular items, and I want to know whether this £29,500 will be applied to these particular items or whether it may be used to cover up expenditure on other items. I support the remarks of The hon. and gallant Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) as to the way in which the Estimates are presented. I do not think it is a businesslike method. You cannot say, "Here we have Items 1, 2 and 3 on which there is a saving, and there we have Items 4, 5 and 6 on which there has been over-spending," but by lumping all together, the particular items on which there has been over-expenditure are covered up, and the Committee have no opportunity of judging whether there has been faulty estimating or whether there is actual extravagance in certain items. It would be much more businesslike if the Estimate showed where savings have taken place and for what items additional expenditure is required.

Mr. THOMAS: I think the Committee will appreciate the criticism which has been directed against the form of these Estimates, and my hon. Friend who has just spoken and The hon. and gallant Member for Burton (Colonel Gretton) will have an opportunity of making their protest in practical form when the Division takes place. I feel we are all indebted to the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs for the very courteous way in which he has acted in a very difficult situation. I find myself in disagreement with my hon. Friend who has moved the reduction in this Vote. He has moved it on two main issues, the first being that there is bad budgeting, and the second that there is a deficit in connection with the Tower of London coupled with a deficit an Carnarvon Castle. What he says, in effect to the Government is, "How is it with all your experience and knowledge of the interest, historical and otherwise, taken in these great national institutions, you come forward with an Estimate showing a deficit of practically £18,000." With regard to the Tower of London I do not know what will be the Government's explanation. Do they suggest that there is less interest taken in the Tower of London than formerly? Do they suggest that people have lost interest in the events of the past in the Tower or the prospects of the future in the Tower? On that matter I
could excuse them, but there is no excuse in the case of Carnarvon Castle. I wish my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to address himself to this point when he has finished getting information—and I hope those who are giving him the information will be able to supply a definite explanation in regard to Carnarvon Castle, because there is great national interest involved in the question. We all know what Carnarvon Castle stands for. We all know who is the Lord High Steward of Carnarvon Castle. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] The present Lord High Steward of Carnarvon Castle is the present Leader of the Liberal party.

Mr. LANSBURY: Do not libel him; he is only the leader of portion of the Liberal party.

HON. MEMBERS: Which portion?

Mr. THOMAS: I was referring to the portion of the Liberal party which is present. I can only address myself to those present. I can see one at this end of the bench and the other at the other end. I put this to The hon. Gentleman opposite: Did the Government, when they were framing this Estimate and calculating that the entrance fee to Carnarvon Castle is 3d. per person, calculate on that basis that there would be so many million people visiting Carnarvon Castle? Ought they not to have known perfectly well that, whatever may have been, a few years ago, the attraction of the Lord High Steward of Carnarvon Castle, there was no possible justification for assuming that that attraction was the same to-day? There never was a Government which made such a colossal blunder? Here is a Government of all the talents, with great political instincts, knowing what political values really meant, and to assume that the Lord High Steward of Carnarvon Castle would have drawn a million people at 3d. per head was a wicked miscalculation. It is sufficient to defeat the existing Government, and I can quite understand these empty Liberal benches now. I can quite understand the burning indignation of hon. Members sitting on those benches when they knew that this Vote was to be challenged.
The Right hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. Hilton Young) has got to associate himself at this time, not with the blunders of his own party, but, if he will only get up and speak, he has got to say: "Yes,
we, the Liberal party, take the full responsibility for the bad budgeting of this Government." Therefore, we feel ourselves compelled to go into the Division Lobby against this Estimate and to say to the Government: If this is your deficit on Carnarvon Castle, what will happen if there is a Carmarthen Castle ever existing?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I feel it is incumbent upon me to rise at once. These two places, the Tower of London and Carnarvon Castle, have been brought into great prominence by the Right hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas), but, as a matter of fact. I do not think there has been any loss in Appropriations-in-Aid up to the present moment.

The CHAIRMAN: Then the subject can no longer be followed.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: In regard to the Tower of London, I believe there has been a very slight falling-off, but I think it was very largely due to the Right hon. Member for Derby himself, who made Wembley so popular. The question of the Appropriations-in-Aid was raised by the hon. Member for Mile End (Mr. Scurr), who said he wanted to hear where the falling-off had taken place. These Appropriations-in-Aid are made up of a large list of miscellaneous items. You have sales of guides and postcards of ancient monuments, you have admission fees to various places of public interest, you have the contributions of landlords towards the cost of repairs, and you have the contributions of owners towards the upkeep of certain interesting ancient monuments, and, as a matter of fact, we based our Estimate on what happened to be a very favourable previous year.

Mr. STEPHEN: When the Labour Government was in office!

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: There was one very large item which we had to drop, and that was a sum of no less than £25,000 which was received from the War Office in respect of the occupation of Alexandra Palace. It is very difficult indeed, in the case of all these miscellaneous items, to know what exactly you are going to receive in the year. My hon. and learned friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Sir E. Hume-Williams) asked
me where the furniture had gone to. I can assure him it did not go to the Brompton Cemetery or to the ancient monuments, as he rather indicated. It was a provision for the reinstatement of furniture in buildings occupied by the Ministry of Pensions hospitals, and also expenditure connected with the fitting up of Gwydyr House, to which a large part of the Air Staff has now moved. The hon. Member for East Bristol (Mr. W. Baker) asked me about the hospital at Leeds, and wanted to know when it would be finished. Well, we hope it will be finished this summer. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Hitchin (Major Kindersley) wanted to know whether this restoration sum was really going to be used for new items to which the House has given no assent. That, of course, is not so. I do not know whether I have rightly interpreted his point, but he put it in this way: Was that money going to be used on new construction? That sum of money is only going to be used as a restoration for the progress of works to which this House has already given assent. It was merely a cut, owing to what we believed would be delays in the progress of the work. Those delays have not materialised, and so we are going on and asking for that extra sum of money.

Major KINDERSLEY: I am afraid I did not make myself quite clear. You made a saving on some items, and you overspent on, we will say, six items. Is that money going to be spent on those items or on some other item to which the House has already given its assent?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: But we have not overspent, and that is the point. This House gave its assent to a certain programme. At the request of the Treasury, we went into it very carefully, and said we would make a cut of £50,000, because it was possible that, owing to delays, we should not be able to get on wish the work in certain directions. Some of those delays have not materialised, and we have been able to get on with the work. Therefore, instead of cutting to the extent of £50,000, we ask for a restoration of £29,000.

Mr. LANSBURY: Can the hon. Gentleman tell us whether any part of the Appropriations-in-Aid is in regard to Kew Gardens?

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: No.

Mr. BECKETT: I wish to point out to hon. Members on the Government benches—who seem to be surprised that we should want to examine these Estimates so closely—that practically the whole of the more important Conservative Press of the country is urging Members of Parliament to enforce economy upon this Government, and warning us that we have before us a Government of spendthrifts, who are badly misusing the national Exchequer, and the manner in which these Supplementary Estimates are presented to this House certainly must give rise to very considerable misgivings. I do not propose to follow my Right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas) into the details of the ancient ruins which he mentioned, because a Member of Parliament sees' plenty of those, but I am more interested in the more modern expenditure included here. At a time when the Government are exercising a certain form of objectionable economy at the expense of the most badly off areas and sections of the population, we certainly ought to have more details as to why they find it necessary to bring in large additional expenditure on a number of the items now before us. It may or may not be necessary for £2,500 extra to have been spent on the Harrow stationery works, but certainly we have not had any particulars from either of the spokesmen for the Government. I was out for about two minutes while the Under-Secretary for the Foreign Office spoke, but I certainly did not gather that he gave us any particulars on that point.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: In my statement I devoted a considerable time to the Harrow printing works.

Mr. BECKETT: I was called out for two minutes, and it must have been in those two minutes while I was gone that The hon. Gentleman spoke on that subject. I apologise. I certainly did hear him dealing with Item C, which gives us an increased expenditure of £23,000, and while I think everybody was impressed with the courteous manner in which the Minister dealt with it, we did not get the amount of information that we have always expected from The hon. Gentleman in the past. I remember when he used to rise from those benches and take the House charmingly into his confidence
about apiaries and things like that, but he did not give us any exact details with regard to that sum of £23,000. I was also disappointed with the right hon. Gentleman the Attorney-General, not with his explanation of Item B.B, which was quite understandable, but because we did not get more particulars in regard to the £43,000 which has to be voted to cover the sum awarded by the War Compensation Court. It may be true that the total sum of £72,000 paid is a very substantial reduction on the amount claimed by the London County Council. We all know that in litigation one side goes for a maximum and one for a minimum, but I think the Committee should have information of the amount actually required for compensation and of the amount swallowed up in legal and Court fees and in paying representatives and other necessary expenses of that kind connected with litigation.
It is a very serious item of national expenditure—the tremendous amount that the Government and all Governments have to pay out on these kinds of cases—and I am hoping yet that those hon. Members opposite who have declared their intention of opposing these Estimates in the Division Lobby will do so when we give them the opportunity.
There is absolutely no reasonable way of enforcing economy upon a Government unless the House is going to insist either that they give us something like correct Budgets at the beginning of the year, or else very detailed accounts indeed of any Supplementary Estimates that they may bring forward. With the one possible exception of Item B.B., there does not seem to be one of these Estimates which people reasonably going into the expenditure of the Office of Works at the beginning of the year could not have foreseen and brought before us, and to leave them out or to spend several thousand pounds extra on one thing and another, to sell old furniture which might quite well have gone on a little longer, to buy new furniture, and to extend works without giving any precise reasons, seems to be a very casual use, to put it mildly, of the very small amount of money at the disposal of the Government. While every vital service is being cut down, while unemployment and education are being scrapped in every direction, it seems very unfortunate that the Government should
have to come to this House at such a difficult time and ask for £5,205,564 in addition to the main Estimates.

8.0 P.M.

Mr. STEPHEN: I simply want to ask the question of The hon. Gentleman who is in charge of the Vote. Under the heading "CC"—Unemployment Relief Works—I notice that there is being asked £9,000, and it is pointed out that that further provision is required to meet certain expenditure on arrears of maintenance work. What I would like the hon. Gentleman to tell us with regard to this additional expenditure is, how much of it was spent in England and how much in Scotland? We have a certain arrangement made with regard to expenditure by which Scotland gets a certain proportion and I have been wondering, in view if what I know of the position of the unemployed in Scotland and maintenance work there, and the very scanty provision that the Government have been making, if we in Scotland have been getting any thing like our appropriate share. Then is another point that I want to make under Item "C"—Maintenance and Repair of Public Offices. I notice in the explanation which is given in the per that the original Estimate provided for a reduction in respect of the cost of services which might not arise during the year. I looked up the Estimate and I find that instead of it showing a decrease, while the figure in 1924–25 amounted to £455,632, the estimate for 1925–26 amounted to £549,811, an increase amounting to £94,179. I do not think I am asking for anything very exceptional in asking for a word of explanation from the Minister. I have no doubt that it is due to the fact that in regard to these explanations which are given, one is forgetting some little fact in connection with the bigger account, and I am also sure that the Minister—

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: I am afraid I have not got the information on the point as to what sum of money has been spent in Scotland, but I will find it out and send it to the hon. Member.

Mr. STEPHEN: In view of the fact that the Minister has not got this information I might perhaps be allowed to move to report Progress. Hon. Members in this House, in which the Scottish Mem- 
bers are in such a great minority, will see the importance of this item from the point of view of our country. We do not want to be vexatious. I think hon. Members know that the Scottish Members are always very reasonable. I am referring to Scottish Members of all parties, Scottish Tories, Scottish Liberals and Scottish Socialist Members. There is general agreement that we are quite willing to accept any reasonable explanation, but I am sure the Minister, even though he himself is representing an English constituency, will see that while he is able to get the information from the officials, there is a representative of Scotland on the front bench and perhaps he, as one of our people in the. Government representing the interests of Scotland, may be able to supply the Minister with this information. Surely on a matter of so great importance as unemployment — on a matter in which it is absolutely necessary that there should be an assurance in Scotland that we are getting a square deal and an appropriate amount spent on our country in ratio to the amount that is spent in England — the Minister is going to meet me in regard to this matter. It is all very well to say that he will get the information and let me have it at some later date, but if he gets me the information and lets me know it at some later date, then we Scottish Members in this House, anxious to secure as fair conditions for our people as possible, will be in the unfortunate position that this Vote will have passed from the House, and we shall have no way of registering our protest.
The Minister has shown us such courtesy throughout that I am quite sure he is not going to make an exception in the way he deals with an important Scottish issue, and that he will meet us in the same way. I do not think, for instance, if he is going to make some concession and we are Bong to hold this Vote over until he gets the information, that really he or the Government will lose very much in the matter. We would be quite willing to try to meet him with regard to letting it go at once if the explanation is satisfactory. Here is money being spent, and the Minister in charge is not able to give us any idea as to whether the ordinary proportions are being apportioned to the various countries. I have no doubt that some
of the Welsh Members in this House will also be anxious for some information in this respect. Really, I think that the Minister, if he cannot give us that information, might give us a little fuller information on this head "CC" than has been given. I do not want to press him unduly in the matter. One recognises that it is a remanet expenditure under arrears of maintenance, but in view of the position that is likely to develop in connection with the general policy of the Government as regards unemployment and in connection with maintenance work that may be undertaken, I think it is of the utmost importance that we should have a clear appreciation of the position under a heading like this.
I know the amount is a small one, £9,000, and that it might seem to be one on which one should not lay an undue amount of stress, but I believe if this Committee is really going to get down to sound economy then it is necessary that

even in small amounts we should have due consideration as to whether those amounts are being well spent. If savings can be made with regard to a whole lot of smaller accounts, then those small savings, made on a large number of small accounts, may amount to more than the saving on one of the bigger accounts and consequently I am hoping that we are going to have a little more information. I am quite sure that the Minister will explain to me the evident disparity regarding the fact that there is this increase under the C.C. head. I am anxious that I should get a reply.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: rose in his place and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Question put, "That the Question be now put"

The Committee divided: Ayes, 253; Noes, 128.

Division No. 11.]
AYES
[8.11. p.m.


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.
Grotrian, H. Brent


Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir. James T.
Colfax, Major Wm. Phillips
Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.


Ainsworth, Major Charles
Cooper, A. Duff
Gunston, Captain D. W.


Alexander, Sir Wm. (Glasgow, Cent'l)
Cope, Major William
Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry


Allen, J. Sandeman (L'pool, W. Derby)
Cowan Sir Wm. Henry (Islingtn, N.)
Harland, A.


Amery, Rt. Hon. Leopold C. M. S.
Craig, Ernest (Chester, Crewe)
Harrison, G. J. C.


Apsley, Lord
Crack, Rt. Hon. Sir. Henry
Harvey, G. (Lambeth, Kennington)


Ashley, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Wilfrid W.
Croft, Brigadier-General Sir H.
Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)


Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)
Haslam, Henry C.


Atkinson, C.
Crookshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)
Headiam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.


Baldwin, Rt. Hon. Stanley
Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Gainsbro)
Henderson, Lieut.-Col. V. L. (Bootle)


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert
Henn, Sir Sydney H.


Barclay-Harvey, C. M.
Curzon, Captain Viscount
Hennessy, Major J. R. G.


Barnett, Major Sir Richard
Dalziel, Sir Davison
Herbert, S. (York, N. R., Scar. & Wh'by)


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Davidson, Major-General Sir John H.
Hills, Major John Walter


Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymoutn, Drake)
Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)
Hogg, Rt. Hon. Sir. D. (St. Marylebone)


Berry, Sir George
Dixey, A. C.
Hohier, Sir Gerald Fitzroy


Betterton, Henry B.
Eden, Captain Anthony
Holland, Sir Arthur


Birchall, Major J. Dearman
Elveden, Viscount
Holt, Capt. H. P.


Bird, E. R. (Yorks, W. R., Skipton)
England, Colonel A.
Homan, C. W. J.


Blundell, F. N.
Erskine, James Malcolm Monteith
Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)


Boothby, R. J. G.
Fairfax, Captain J. G.
Hope, Sir Harry (Forfar)


Bourne, Captain Robert Croft
Falle, Sir Bertram G.
Hopkins, J. W. W.


Brass, Captain W.
Fermoy, Lord
Hopkinson, A. (Lancaster, Mossley)


Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive
Fielden, E. B.
Howard, Captain Hon. Donald


Briggs, J. Harold
Finburgh, S.
Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)


Briscoe, Richard George
Forestier-Walker, Sir L.
Hudson, R. S. (Cumberland, Whiteh'n)


Brittain, Sir Harry
Forrest, W.
Hume-Williams, Sir W. Ellis


Brocklebank, C. E. R.
Foster, Sir Harry S.
Huntingfield, Lord


Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.
Fraser, Captain Ian
Hurd, Percy A.


Broun-Lindsay, Major H.
Frece, Sir Walter de
Iliffe, Sir Edward M.


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Berks, Newb'y)
Fremantle, Lt-Col. Francis E.
Inskip, Sir Thomas Walker H.


Bullock, Captain M.
Gadie, Lieut.-Col. Anthony
Jackson, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. F. S.


Burman, J. B.
Galbraith, J. F. W.
Jephcott, A. R.


Burton, Colonel H. W.
Ganzoni Sir John
Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)


Butler, Sir Geoffrey
Gates, Percy
Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)


Butt, Sir Alfred
Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton
Kindersley, Major Guy M.


Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir. Evelyn (Aston)
Gee, Captain R.
King, Captain Henry Douglas


Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
Knox, Sir Alfred


Chapman, Sir S.
Gilmour, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir. John
Lamb, J. Q.


Charteris, Brigadier-General J.
Glyn, Major R. G. C.
Lane Fox, Col. Rt. Hon. George R.


Christie, J. A.
Goff, Sir Park
Lister, Cunliffe-, Rt. Hon. Sir. Philip


Churchman, Sir Arthur C.
Gower, Sir Robert
Little, Dr. E. Graham


Clarry, Reginald George
Grace, John
Lloyd, Cyril E. (Dudley)


Clayton, G. C.
Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.
Locker, Lampson, G. (Wood Green)


Cobb, Sir Cyril
Greene, W. P. Crawford
Loder, J. de V.


Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.
Gretton, Colonel John
Looker, Herbert William


Lougher, L.
Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)
Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.


Lumley, L. R.
Philipson, Mabel
Streatfeild, Captain S. R.


MacAndrew, Charles Glen
Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray Fraser


Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)
Price, Major C. W. M.
Sugden, Sir Wilfrid


Macdonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)
Radford, E. A.
Tasker, Major R. Inigo


McDonnell, Colonel Hon. Angus
Ramsden, E.
Thom, Lt.-Col. J. G. (Dumbarton)


MacIntyre, I.
Rawson, Sir Alfred Cooper
Thomas, Sir Robert John (Anglesey)


McLean Major A.
Rees, Sir Beddoe
Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)


Macmillan, Captain H.
Reid, Capt. A. S. C. (Warrington)
Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement


McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John
Reid, D. D. (County Down)
Wallace, Captain D. E.


Macquisten, F. A.
Remer, J. R.
Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.


Maitland, Sir Arthur D. Steel-
Remnant, Sir James
Warrender, Sir Victor


Manningham-Buller, Sir Mervyn
Rentoul, G. S.
Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otley)


Margesson, Captain D.
Richardson, Sir P. W. (Sur'y, Ch'ts'y)
Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)


Marriott, Sir J. A. R.
Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)
Wells, S. R.


Merriman, F. B.
Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)
White, Lieut. Colonel G. Dalrymple


Meyer, Sir Frank
Ropner, Major L.
Wiggins, William Martin


Milne, J. S. Wardlaw
Ruggles-Brise. Major E. A.
Williams, A. M. (Cornwall, Northern)


Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)
Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)


Moore, Lieut.-Colonel T. C. H. (Ayr)
Rye, F. G.
Williams, Herbert G. (Reading)


Moore, Sir Newton J.
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)
Wilson, Sir C. H. (Leeds, Central)


Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T. C.
Sandeman, A. Stewart
Wilson, R. R. (Stafford, Lichfield)


Moreing, Captain A. H.
Sanders, Sir Robert A.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Morrison, H. (Wilts, Salisbury)
Sandon, Lord
Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl


Morrison-Bell, Sir Arthur Clive
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.
Wise, Sir Fredric


Murchison, C. K.
Savery, S. S.
Womersley, W. J.


Nall, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Joseph
Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W. R., Sowerby)
Wood, B. C. (Somerset, Bridgwater)


Nelson, Sir Frank
Sheffield, Sir Berkeley
Wood, Sir Kingsley (Woolwich, W.).


Neville, R. J.
Sinclair, Col. T. (Queen's Univ., Belfst.)
Wood, Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)


Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)
Skelton, A. N.
Woodcock, Colonel H. C.


Nicholson, Col. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Ptrsf'ld.)
Slaney, Major P. Kenyon
Worthington-Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir L.


Nield, Rt. Hon. Sir Herbert
Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dine, C.)
Wragg, Herbert


Oakley, T.
Smith-Carington, Neville W.
Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.


O'Connor, T. J. (Bedford, Luton)
Smithers, Waldron
Young, Rt. Hon. Hilton (Norwich)


O'Neill, Major Rt. Hon. Hugh
Stanley, Col. Hon. G. F. (Will'sden, E.)



Pennefather, Sir John
Stanley, Lord (Fylde)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Percy, Lord Eustace (Hastings)
Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)
Mr. F. C. Thomson and Captain


Perkins, Colonel E. K.
Steel, Major Samuel Strang
Bowyer.


Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Storry-Deans, R.



NOES.


Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fife, West)
Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)
Saklatvala, Shapurji


Alexander, A. V. (Sheffield, Hillsbro')
Hardie, George D.
Salter, Dr. Alfred


Ammon, Charles George
Hayday, Arthur
Scrymgeour, E.


Attlee, Clement Richard
Hayes, John Henry
Scurr, John


Baker, Walter
Henderson, Right Hon. A. (Burnley)
Sexton, James


Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)
Shaw, Rt. Hon. Thomas (Preston)


Barr, J.
Hirst, G. H.
Shiels, Dr. Drummond


Batey, Joseph
Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)
Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)


Beckett, John (Gateshead)
Hore-Belisha, Leslie
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir John


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)
Slesser, Sir Henry H.


Broad, F. A.
Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)
Smillie, Robert


Bromfield, William
Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)
Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)


Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Smith, H. B. Lees (Keighley)


Buchanan, G.
Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)
Smith, Rennie (Penistone)


Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel
Kelly, W. T.
Snell, Harry


Cape, Thomas
Kennedy, T.
Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip


Charleton, H. C.
Kirkwood, D.
Spencer, G. A (Broxtowe)


Clowes, S.
Lansbury, George
Stamford, T. W.


Cluse, W. S.
Lee, F.
Stephen, Campbell


Collins, Sir Godfrey (Greenock)
Lowth, T.
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)


Compton, Joseph
Lunn, William
Sutton, J. E.


Connolly, M.
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)
Taylor, R. A.


Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)
Mackinder, W.
Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)


Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)
MacLaren, Andrew
Thomson, Trevelyan (Middlesbro, W.)


Davies, Ellis (Denbigh, Denbigh)
Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)
Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)


Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)
March, S.
Thurtle, E.


Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)
Maxton, James
Tinker, John Joseph


Dennison, R.
Mitchell, E. Rosslyn (Paisley)
Townend, A. E.


Duncan, C.
Montague, Frederick
Varley, Frank B.


Edwards, C. (Monmouth, Bedwellty)
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, North)
Viant, S. P.


Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.
Naylor, T. E.
Wallhead, Richard C.


Gibbins, Joseph
Oliver, George Harold
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Gillett, George M.
Owen, Major G.
Warne, G. H.


Gosling, Harry
Palin, John Henry
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Paling, W.
Welsh, J. C.


Graham, Rt. Hon. Wm. (Edin., Cent.)
Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.
Westwood, J.


Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)
Potts, John S.
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.


Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Wilkinson, Ellen C.


Grundy, T. W.
Ritson, J.
Williams, David (Swansea, East)


Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)
Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R. Elland)
Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)


Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)
Rose, Frank H.
Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)




Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)
Wright, W.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)
Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)
Mr. Alien Parkinson and Mr. A.


Windsor, Walter

Barnes.

Question put accordingly, "That a sum, not exceeding £158,245, be granted for the said Service."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 132; Noes, 251.

Division No.12.]
AYES.
[8.20 p.m.


Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fife, West)
Hayes, John Henry
Shaw, Rt. Hon. Thomas (Preston)


Alexander, A. V. (Sheffield, Hillsbro')
Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Burnley)
Shiels, Dr, Drummond


Ammon, Charles George
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)
Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)


Attlee, Clement Richard
Hirst, G. H.
Slesser, Sir Henry H.


Baker, Walter
Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)
Smillie, Robert


Barker, G. (Monmouth, Abertillery)
Hore-Belisha, Leslie
Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)


Barnes, A.
Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)
Smith, H. B. Lees- (Keighley)


Barr, J.
Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)
Smith, Rennie (Penistone)


Batey, Joseph
Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)
Snell, Harry


Beckett, John (Gateshead)
Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)
Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Spencer, G. A. (Broxtowe)


Broad, F. A.
Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)
Stamford, T. W.


Bromfield, William
Kelly, W. T.
Stephen, Campbell


Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)
Kennedy, T.
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)


Buchanan, G.
Kirkwood, D.
Sutton, J. E.


Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel
Lansbury, George
Taylor, R. A.


Cape, Thomas
Lee, F.
Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)


Charleton, H. C.
Lowth, T.
Thomas, Sir Robert John (Anglesey)


Clowes, S.
Lunn, William
Thomson, Trevelyan (Middlesbro, W.)


Cluse, W. S.
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)
Thorne, W. (West Ham, Plaistow)


Collins, Sir Godfrey (Greenock)
Mackinder, W.
Thurtle, E.


Compton, Joseph
MacLaren, Andrew
Tinker, John Joseph


Connolly, M.
Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)
Townend, A. E.


Cowan, D. M. (Scottish Universities)
March, S.
Varley, Frank B.


Davies, Evan (Ebbw Vale)
Maxton, James
Viant, S. P.


Davies, Ellis (Denbigh, Denbigh)
Mitchell, E. Rosslyn (Paisley)
Wallhead, Richard C.


Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)
Montague, Frederick
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, N.)
Warne, G. H.


Dennison, R.
Naylor, T. E.
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Duncan, C.
Oliver, George Harold
Welsh, J. C.


Garro-Jones, Captain G. M.
Owen, Major G.
Westwood, J.


Gibbins, Joseph
Palin, John Henry
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. J.


Gillett, George M.
Paling, W.
Wiggins, William Martin


Gosling, Harry
Pethick-Lawrence, F. W.
Wilkinson, Ellen C.


Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Potts, John S.
Williams, David (Swansea, East)


Graham, Rt. Hon. Wm. (Edin., Cent.)
Remer, J. R.
Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)


Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)
Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)


Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)
Ritson, J.
Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)


Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R., Elland)
Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)


Grundy, T. W.
Rose, Frank H.
Windsor, Walter


Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)
Saklatvala, Shapurji
Wright, W.


Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)
Salter, Dr. Alfred
Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)


Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)
Scrymgeour, E.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Hardie, George D.
Scurr, John
Mr. Allen Parkinson and Mr.


Hayday, Arthur
Sexton, James
Charles Edwards.


NOES


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Brass, captain W.
Cochrane, Commander Hon. A. D.


Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir. James T.
Bridgeman, Rt. Hon. William Clive
Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.


Ainsworth, Major Charles
Briggs, J. Harold
Colfox, Major Wm. Phillips


Alexander, Sir Wm. (Glasgow, Cent'l)
Briscoe, Richard George
Cooper, A. Duff


Allen, J. Sundeman (L'pool, W. Derby)
Brittain, Sir Harry
Cowan, Sir Wm. Henry (Islington, N.)


Amery, Rt. Hon. Leopold C. M. S.
Brocklebank, C. E. R.
Craig, Ernest (Chester, Crewe)


Apsley, Lord
Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.
Craik, Rt. Hon. Sir. Henry


Ashley, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Wilfrid W.
Broun-Lindsay, Major H.
Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)


Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Berks, Newb'y)
Crookshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)


Atkinson, C.
Bullock, Captain M.
Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Gainsbro)


Baldwin, At. Hon. Stanley
Burman, J. B.
Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Burton, Colonel H. W.
Curzon, Captain Viscount


Barclay-Harvey, C. M.
Butler, Sir Geoffrey
Dalkeith, Earl of


Barnett, Major Sir Richard
Butt, Sir Alfred
Dalziel, Sir Davison


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Cecil, Rt. Hon. Sir. Evelyn (Aston)
Davidson, Major-General Sir J. H.


Benn, Sir A. S. (Plymouth, Drake)
Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)


Berry, Sir George
Chapman, Sir S.
Dixey, A. C.


Betterton, Henry B.
Charteris, Brigadier-General J.
Eden, Captain Anthony


Birchall, Major J. Dearman
Christie, J. A.
Elveden, Viscount


Bird, E. R. (Yorks, W. R., Skipton)
Churchman, Sir Arthur C.
England, Colonel A.


Blundell, F. N.
Clarry, Reginald George
Erskine, James Malcolm Monteith


Boothby, R. J. G.
Clayton, G. C.
Fairfax, Captain J. G.


Bourne, Captain Robert Croft
Cobb, Sir Cyril
Falle, Sir Bertram G.


Fermoy, Lord
Lamb, J. Q.
Rantoul, G. S.


Fielden, E. B.
Lane Fox, Col. Rt. Hon. George R.
Richardson, Sir P. W. (Sur'y, Ch'ts'y)


Finburgh, S.
Lister, Cunliffe-, Rt. Hon. Sir. Philip
Roberts, E. H. G. (Flint)


Forestier-Walker, Sir L.
Little, Dr. E. Graham
Roberts, Samuel (Hereford, Hereford)


Forrest, W.
Lloyd, Cyril E. (Dudley)
Ropner, Major L.


Foster, Sir Harry S.
Locker-Lampoon, G. (Wood Green)
Ruggles-Brise, Major E. A.


Fraser, Captain Ian
Loder, J. de V.
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)


Frece, Sir Walter de
Looker, Herbert William
Rye, F. G.


Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.
Lougher, L.
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)


Gadie, Lieut.-Col. Anthony
Lumley, L. R.
Sandeman, A. Stewart


Galbraith, J. F. W.
Lynn, Sir Robert J.
Sanders, Sir Robert A.


Ganzoni, Sir John
MacAndrew, Charles Glen
Sandon Lord


Gates, Percy
Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.


Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton
Macdonald, R. (Glasgow, Cathcart)
Savery, S. S.


Gee, Captain R.
McDonnell, Colonel Hon. Angus
Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W. R., Sowerby)


Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
MacIntyre, Ian
Sheffield, Sir Berkeley


Gilmour, Lt.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir. John
McLean, Major A.
Sinclair, Col. T. (Queen's Univ., Belfast)


Glyn, Major R. G. C.
Macmillan, Captain H.
Skelton, A. N.


Goff, Sir Park
McNeill, Rt. Hon. Ronald John
Slaney, Major P. Kenyon


Gower, Sir Robert
Macquisten, F. A.
Smith, R. W. (Aberd'n & Kinc'dine, C.)


Grace, John
Maitland, Sir Arthur D. Steel
Smith-Carington, Neville W.


Grattan-Doyle, Sir N.
Manningham-Buller, Sir Mervyn
Smithers, Waldron


Greene, W. P. Crawford
Margesson, Capt. D.
Stanley, Col. Hon. G. F. (Will'sden, E.)


Grotrian, H. Brent
Marriott, Sir J. A. R.
Stanley, Lord (Fylde)


Guinness, Rt. Hon. Walter E.
Merriman, F. B.
Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)


Gunston, Captain D. W.
Meyer, Sir Frank
Steel, Major Samuel Strang


Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry
Milne, J. S. Wardlaw
Storry-Deans, R.


Harland, A.
Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)
Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.


Harrison, G. J. C.
Moore, Lieut.-Colonel T. C. R. (Ayr)
Streatfelid, Captain S. R.


Harvey, G. (Lambeth, Kennington)
Moore, Sir Newton J.
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Murray Fraser


Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)
Moore-Brabazon, Lieut.-Col. J. T. C.
Sugden, Sir Wilfrid


Haslam, Henry C.
Morden, Col. W. Grant
Tasker, Major R. Inigo


Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.
Moreing, Captain A. H.
Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)


Henderson, Lieut.-Col. V. L. (Bootle)
Morrison, H. (Wilts, Salisbury)
Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, South)


Henn, Sir Sydney H.
Morrison-Bell, Sir Arthur Clive
Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement


Hennessy, Major J. R. G.
Murchison, C. K.
Wallace, Captain D. E.


Herbert, S. (York, N. R., Scar. & Wh'by)
Nall, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Joseph
Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.


Hills, Major John Walter
Nelson, Sir Frank
Warrender, Sir Victor


Hogg, Rt. Hon. Sir. D. (St. Marylebone)
Neville, R. J.
Watson, Sir F. (Pudsey and Otley)


Hohler, Sir Gerald Fitzroy
Newton, Sir D. G. C. (Cambridge)
Watson, Rt. Hon. W. (Carlisle)


Holland, Sir Arthur
Nicholson, Col. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Ptrsf'ld.)
Wells, S. R.


Holt, Captain H. P.
Nield, Rt. Hon. Sir. Herbert
White, Lieut.-Colonel G. Dalrymple


Homan, C. W. J.
Oakley, T.
Williams, A. M. (Cornwall, Northern)


Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)
O'Connor, T. J. (Bedford, Luton)
Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)


Hope, Sir Harry (Forfar)
O'Neill, Major Rt. Hon. Hugh
Williams, Herbert G. (Reading)


Hopkins, J. W. W.
Ponnefather, Sir John
Wilson, Sir C. H. (Leeds, Central)


Hopkinson, A. (Lancaster, Mossley)
Percy, Lord Eustace (Hastings)
Wilson, R. R. (Stafford, Lichfield)


Howard, Captain Hon. Donald
Perkins, Colonel E. K.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)
Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl


Hudson, R. S. (Cumberl'nd, Whiteh'n)
Peto, G. (Somerset, Frome)
Wise, Sir Fredric


Hume-Williams, Sir W. Ellis
Philipson, Mabel
Womersley, W. J.


Huntingfield, Lord
Plicher, G.
Wood, B. C. (Somerset, Bridgwater)


Hurd, Percy A.
Pownall, Lieut.-Colonel Assheton
Wood, Sir Kingsley (Woolwich, W.)


Iliffe, Sir Edward M.
Price, Major C. W. M.
Wood, Sir S. Hill- (High Peak)


Inskip, Sir Thomas Walker H.
Radford, E. A.
Woodcock, Colonel H. C.


Jackson, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. F. S.
Ramsden, E.
Worthington, Evans, Rt. Hon. Sir. L.


Jephcott, A. R.
Rawson, Sir Alfred Cooper
Wragg, Herbert


Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)
Rees, Sir Beddoe
Yerburgh, Major Robert D. T.


Kindersley, Major Guy M.
Reid, Capt. A. S. C. (Warrington)
Young, Rt. Hon. Hilton (Norwich)


King, Captain Henry Douglas
Reid, D. D. (County Down)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Knox, Sir Alfred
Remnant, Sir James
Major Cope and Captain Bowyer.


Original Question put accordingly, and agreed to.

Mr. LOCKER-LAMPSON: claimed, "That the Original Question be now put."

It being after a Quarter-past Eight of the Clock, further Proceeding was postponed, without Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 4.

Orders of the Day — INCREASE OF PRODUCTION.

Mr. SMITHERS: I beg to move,
That this House is of the opinion that the solution of the present economic and
industrial situation in this country lies in increased production, with adequate remuneration to the worker in proportion to output, thus enabling this country successfully to compete in the markets of the world, and consequently to increase her exports.
Any new Member who is fortunate enough to draw a place in the Ballot must feel the great responsibility placed upon him. I have put down this Motion to-night because I believe that what I am here advocating is vital to the existence of the people of this country. Increased production at competitive prices is the only way we can make pro-
gress, raise wages, reduce unemployment, and raise the standard of life of the workers of this country. May I be permitted to put before the House one or two elementary truths about the conditions under which we in this country, whether we like it or not, under whatever Government is in power, have got to live? If we ignore them we cannot hope successfully to solve the difficult problems before the country. In all our political and economic discussions let us remember always that Great Britain is different from every other country in the world. We are not only an island in the North Sea with a large population, but we do not grow enough food in these islands; we do not produce enough raw material either to feed our people or to keep our people in employment.
Our very existence economically depends upon our power to import about four-fifths of our food and raw materials. This food and those raw materials do not rain down upon us like manna from Heaven, but have to be paid for by the export of goods or of services at such a cost level that we can compete, and compete successfully, in the markets of the world. The logical conclusion is that otherwise we shall starve. The process may be long and painful, but the end is certain. Last year the excess of visible imports over visible exports was between £350,000,000 and £400,000,000, the balance being made up by invisible exports, which enabled us to meet our heavy burdens of rates and taxes to pay interest on our National Debt and to about balance our national balance-sheet. During the past few years the balance standing to the credit of this country at the end of each year has become less and less. This cannot be allowed to continue. The situation must be faced with courage by the nation as a whole, and with a will to overcome it. But I submit that the basic remedy is to be found in increased production at a cost level which will enable us to increase our exports, combined with a determined effort to economise in national expenditure. Subsidies and subventions only tend to obscure and to make the situation in the end more serious.

Mr. MacLAREN: Hear, hear!

Mr. SMITHERS: Some lasting remedy must be found, and must be found quickly. I am confident that a solu-
tion is not difficult to find if masters and men alike would substitute, for those leaders who persist in turning economic questions into political questions, fair-minded, able, capable business men. Surely this is too vital a matter for political controversy. If economic issues were put before the workers of this country as clearly as political issues are—

Mr. MacLAREN: God help the country!

Mr. SMITHERS: —I believe that the problem would be halfway to solution. Tell the men the truth, the economic truth, and I believe the immediate response would take the form of increased production. British industry would prosper, and British wages would increase. Increased production means increased wages.

Mr. R. RICHARDSON: Does it?

Mr. SMITHERS: And, what is more important, increased purchasing power. In America to-day there is practically no unemployment. In this country, speaking in round figures, we are crying out for a million houses, but we have a million unemployed. Has the building industry in this country as a whole done its level best to increase the production of houses and to absorb as many as possible of the unemployed? I, for one, feel it has not. Restriction of production in the building industry, which is prompted by a selfish and short-sighted policy, prevents industry developing as fast as it might, and ignores the misery and inconvenience that such a policy causes. The American worker today is enjoying higher wages and a fuller share of the pleasures and necessaries of life not because he is working longer hours but because he believes that the maximum output per man per hour means the creation of wealth. In America they see to it that every device and invention is utilised which will increase production and lighten men's tasks. I would respectfully ask, Can the trades unions of this country say with sincerity that they have welcomed every method and device and invention which would increase production, and have they urged their members to use those means effectively? The mineowners of this country are asking for an eight-hours' day, which has produced a slogan "Not a second on the day, and not a cent off the pay." I venture to
submit that both parties have entirely missed the point. We in this country have spent too much time in discussing the number of hours and the amount of wages, and too little time in discussing the purchasing power of wages and the output per man per hour.
I know the difficulties and the dangers of comparing the output per man in the coal mines of America with the output per man in the coal mines of England. I want to give just a, few figures to show that during the present century the output per man in America has enormously increased, while the output per man in this country has decreased. My figures cover a period of 23 years. In 1901 we produced per man per year in this country 281 tons of coal; in America they produced 543 tons. In 1923 we produced in this country 229 tons per man per year; in America they produced 682 tons. During that period the American production per man per year increased 139 tons, while our production decreased by 52 tons. These figures are taken from the official returns of the Mines Department. I do not say for one moment that we can hope to obtain the same production as in America, owing to the various differences in the circumstances between the two countries and the natural advantages they enjoy in America. In view of these circumstances, we cannot hope to obtain as much output per man as in America, but I do believe the difference is greater than it need be, and greater than it ought to be.
I want to say quite definitely and with respect that I support and always have supported trade unions because I believe they are an especially necessary and useful factor in our present industrial system. I also want to say, and I say it quite definitely, that in the interests of the trade unions themselves and of the country I view with alarm, and, I believe, the country views with alarm, the destructive influences that have, arisen within their ranks which, to satisfy political vanity, are playing with forces they will not be able to control or to direct, and which policy, if persisted in, must ultimately bring about a national calamity. I am forced to the conclusion, after careful inquiry, that the greatest hindrance to an increase of production is the policy of restriction of output
which is pursued—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where?"]—and the coercion which is all too frequently practised to secure that end. [HON. MEMBERS: "Where?"]

Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER (Captain FitzRoy): I hope hon. Members will allow The hon. Member to proceed with his speech.

Mr. SMITHERS: I am trying to compress what I have got to say into 20 minutes, and I have on purpose refrained from going into details, because I conceive it to be the duty of an opener of a Debate of this kind to put forward broad views and to allow the discussion to take form from what I have moved. I submit that this policy of restriction of output, if persisted in, means national suicide, and the people who will suffer most will be the members of trade unions, for whose interests their leaders are responsible. If I thought it was helping the situation I would support it with all my power. I want to call the attention of this House and the country to the exploitation of the power of production of the finest workers in the whole world for political purposes. Trade unions have perfected a system of industrial organisation, but they have used their great power and influence not in the direction of tackling the more fundamental question of increasing production.
A policy of this kind tends to create in men's minds that they need not make the most of the talents which God has given them, because they are led to believe that, after all, the State is a kind of fairy godmother with a bottomless purse. There are two methods by which I believe this policy can be exploded. The first is the Prime Minister's method, with which I respectfully and heartily agree, of appealing for peace in industry and appealing to the reason and common sense of the people of this country, and by telling the people the truth in such a manner that we may obtain very willing co-operation to increase production and thereby to create wealth for the benefit of all. The other method is a continued decline in our industry, and, therefore, one of decreased production. The country will have to realise the economic truth of this by the bitter experience of further unemployment and all the misery that it entails. Some of the most thoughtful men with whom I
have talked, who have no axe to grind but the good of this country, have expressed the opinion that if such a situation should arise we might never be able to recover from it. Therefore, I appeal to all to realise the necessity of increasing production before it is too late and before we have lost our markets. I hope the House will not think I am neglecting a very important point of the Resolution. I will not now give my reasons to show how the workers who increase production can share, and share fairy, in the result of their labours. I understand that that subject is being dealt with by another speaker, and, therefore, I do not propose to go into it now.
I am supported in much that I have said to-night by a speech quoted in the "Times" of the 3rd December, 1920. The words are so weighty that I hope the House will forgive me if I read the quotation:
Our educational system, I think, has not yet reached the point of teaching the mass of the community some of those simpler and elementary facts in political economy which it would be well for every man and woman in the country to know. There are workmen who think that if they do less there will be more for someone else to do. I submit against that view the results of experience, which are the real test. From one cause or another this year of 1920 has been one of low production, and it is towards the end of this year of low production that we see the highest figure of unemployment. … If it were true that low production found work for others, that would have solved your unemployment problem. … It is, I think, proper for the workers to secure safeguards against unemployment and against additional output being of greater benefit to employers than to anyone else; but"—
and I would ask the House to mark these words—
even if those safeguards cannot be secured, it would, I believe, still be desirable enormously to increase output of commodities, for that increase would confer more benefit on the working class than on any other class in the country. … Plenty, then, is the friend of the worker. Increased production lessens his difficulties; decreased production increases his burdens and diminishes the purchasing power of his wages.
Those words are reported to have been said by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Platting (Mr. Clynes). I submit that what this country is suffering from to-day is not over-production, but under-consumption. Under-consumption is due to under-production. One of the
greatest students of our present economic situation expressed the following opinion:
That this country is capable of industrial expansion, even up to the limits of its present productive capacity, is unquestioned, provided the will to do it exists.'
Unhampered by trade union regulations, and inspired by a common purpose, we astonished ourselves and the world by our vast production during the War. The situation to-day, though different, is, I submit, as serious as that of 1914. It requires the same energy of effort, and the same unity of purpose. Cannot we recapture the spirit of 1914, and again astonish ourselves and the world? Low production is mainly responsible for low wages. Restricted production means restriction of wages. Increased production, I submit, means increased wages, increased prosperity, greater purchasing power, and a better standard of life for the workers of this country.
9.0 P.M.
I hope the House will not think that am talking in a too pessimistic vein. We have had signs recently that trade is improving, and I devoutly hope that nothing will be done to dash those hopes to the ground by anyone or by any section of the community in this country. When any Member of this House has the honour to move a Resolution, he naturally hopes that it will have some practical effect. In view of the decision that is to be taken next May, I hope it will lead to a national appreciation of the position which will result in a determination by increased output to bring about an industrial revival; and, if the same determination were shown to sink individual differences, to emphasise points of agreement, and to discuss points of divergence and difference with a view to securing agreement, I believe the difficulties under which we now labour would soon disappear. If it be answered that that is a counsel of perfection, I would reply that self-preservation is the strongest motive that dominates human thoughts and actions, and it is that and nothing else that is at stake. I urge that this increased production and this industrial revival can be secured by the co-operation of all men and women who have the future and the prosperity of this country and its people at heart.

Brigadier-General CHARTERIS: I beg to second the Motion.
I think that the present time is a particularly opportune one for a Motion of this nature. There is, of course, no doubt that in the Motion itself there are certain points with which people will disagree, but some parts of it, I think, must commend themselves to the whole of the House. Increased production in itself is, of course, obviously desirable. Adequate remuneration is an idea which, I think, commends itself to all parts of the House. It is particularly opportune that it should be brought forward at the present moment, because the minds of the whole country are stirred by and interested in economic problems, owing to the fact that we are not far distant from what may be one of the most serious crises through which this country has ever passed. For this reason, if for no other, I think it is desirable that, by a Debate in the House at this moment, attention should be attracted to an economic problem of this sort. But there are other reasons. The Locarno Pact and the reversion to the gold standard have removed the last of the War controls, and, in the year upon which we are now entering, we shall begin a new phase—a phase where competition will again be, in a larger measure, unrestricted.
By the Locarno Pact we again allow, and it is desirable to allow, Germany to enter into free competition with us; and, owing to the return to the gold standard it is estimated by our economists that our costs of production have somehow or other to go down by 10 per cent. I do not know if the actual figure will be accepted by all but, taking it as the immediate requirement and adding it to the 10 per cent. Which is generally accepted as the reduction necessary in the cost of production before the gold standard was reverted to, we get a figure of between 20 and 25 per cent. as the lowest to which our cost of production has to be reduced if we are to be successful. It is not a question of whether we can reduce that amount. It is a, necessity if we are to compete successfully in foreign markets, and without successful competition it is difficult to see how the country can survive. There are certain other factors which have to be borne in mind. The whole country has welcomed the indications that the trade of the country has definitely turned the corner. There may be an improvement for causes
other than those which are suggested in the Motion. It may be that even if we cannot bring about a reduction in costs some other events in some other part of the world may give us temporary assistance. Quite obviously France, in a few months, or possibly in a few years, cannot compete on the same favourable terms as she is doing now. All these factors must, of course, be taken into consideration, yet the great fact remains that if we can by some means or other reduce our cost of production while still giving adequate remuneration to the workers we shall have made a long step towards prosperity.
The crux of the Motion to my mind is in the question of adequate remuneration to the workers. I do not think hon. Members opposite really believe any one on these benches wishes to see the standard of living of the country reduced. I do not believe people in the country think the party to which I belong in any way desires to see that. We give equal credit to hon. Members opposite that, if we can suggest any solution that is economically sound, they for their part will, in the national interest, be prepared to support it. When you come to analyse the means by which a Resolution of this nature can be given actual effect to, of course, the difficulty begins, and it is to meet that difficulty that I ask the House to listen to me for a few moments. Cost of production is, of course, intimately connected with the question of output. It is axiomatic that with a greater output overhead charges decrease and the whole cost of production goes down, but there are other factors far more important, in a way, than even overhead charges. There is faulty management, which everyone admits has a disastrous effect on output. There is restricted output from whatever reason that may occur, whether it be restrictions, which are due in themselves to faulty management, or restrictions due to the individual who voluntarily does not desire to work his hardest, or whether they are imposed by some outside organisation, but it cannot be disputed that restricted output means necessarily increased cost of production. In addition to that you may have interrupted output. It may be due to trade disputes, it may be due for the moment to the lack of a market or to a sheer accident, such as a fire.
All those things mean interrupted output, which necessarily adds to the cost of production. Further, there is low production which may be due to the inherent incapacity of the person concerned in the industry to do better than he is doing at present—to work up to the average of his capacity. I put that aside, because anyone who has studied trade abroad knows that our workers, and I believe, in general, the management in the country also, is as competent as are the workers and management in other parts of the world.
Turn back then to the only two things with which we can deal. That is to say, restricted output through faulty management, or some other cause — I think we have long passed the day when anyone believes that any party in the State, or any given body of men, desire to bolster up faulty management at the expense of the industry of the worker or of the country. The trouble is how to improve it. Inspection—intervention by the State—is not, in my opinion, at all likely to be effective. Competition—and the closer the competition is the more immediate is the correction—appears to be the corrective found by nature for faulty management. It would appear to be in that that we have to put our trust. But there are other factors also which have to be considered. If you look to the experience of Germany, if you pin your faith to the grouping together of industries and careful inspection by the State or any other superimposed body, that was tried in Germany in the mines and failed. The failure was brought to notice by the commission appointed in 1919 by the German Government, and brought to notice in no uncertain terms. Of course, that does not debar the subject from being discussed and does not debar the theory of larger management, even State control, being believed in, but it is a consideration which one cannot, I think, if one is fair minded, put entirely out of one's mind when looking at a problem of this nature.
Then you get the problem, shorn of State management, of larger groupings. On the other side of the Atlantic that has been tried successfully. There, under materially different conditions, though certain of the factors are the same, high wages have not produced a more ex-
pensive article and have not materially raised the cost of production. We know also that by mass production, by grouping industries into great groups to meet competition, great things have been achieved. The question is whether that is possible in this country. One of the troubles, it appears to me, with regard to those groupings of industry, that bringing together of great numbers of men working under one control, is that for the mass of the men you take away the spur of personal ambition. There does not appear, to the individual workman in the trade, the same immediate outlet for his ambition that there necessarily is in a smaller concern. The question we have to consider is whether by any means we can produce any other method whereby the worker can be induced to produce of his best. We want to find some legitimate opportunity of satisfying the perfectly legitimate ambitions of the individual worker. I am told, and I believe it is true, that in the newer countries on the other side of the Atlantic the transsition from the working stage to the management stage is far easier and far more often accomplished than it is in this country. One would like very much, if it were possible, to see steps taken which would make that transition equally easy here.
There are schemes of co-partnership, bonus schemes, profit-sharing schemes, all schemes which try to give a personal inducement to the worker in the progress and success of the industry in which he is engaged. All these schemes are greatly to be praised and greatly to be helped, but there is one difficulty in them which I see, and which I do not see how to improve. The return is necessarily slow. It is difficult to see how the individual worker even under the most complete profit-sharing or co-partnership scheme, the rightly ambitious individual, will get complete satisfaction out of the share of profits which he may obtain. Experience has shown that although a great number of firms are still engaged—they number 240—in schemes of co-partnership in one form or another, the firms that take up these proposals go through what is almost a regular cycle. They adopt the scheme at first with enthusiasm, then they cool off and gradually, for some reason or other, the history has been that the schemes have been dropped. I do not think that is inherent in the
system, but I do think it means that the system of co-partnership, which I would advocate to the utmost, requires most careful examination and requires, if possible, that some alteration should be made whereby the remuneration to the worker by co-partnership should be greater than at the present time.
There are certain other considerations to which I would like, briefly, to direct the attention of the House. I am not blind to the fact that although the present situation must give us all cause for concern, yet actually, in competition with the rest of the world, we have not done badly since the War. We have retained our due proportion of the total markets of the world. The loss in our trade is due to the fall in the total markets of the world, and not to the fact that we are not competing with equal success with other countries. That is not enough. We have to try by some means or other to get greater production, greater output, and great efficiency in management. Conciliation, concession and self-sacrifice, as one hon. Member opposite suggested, are desirable. The trouble about conciliation and concession always appears to me when it is interpreted in trade disputes on both sides to be, "You concede and I conciliate." That is a, danger that has to be avoided in any disputes that come in the future.
I urge the House in the Debate that is to take place to bear in mind that, in spite of all the efforts we have made since the conclusion of peace, in spite of the £750,000,000 of debts which we have solved, in spite of the fact that we have maintained our proportion of the world's markets, nobody looking at the future can be wholly satisfied. I would ask the House to look at this Motion, not as though it contained any panacea, because it does not, for all the evils of the moment, but to look at it and reflect whether it is not possible that in this Motion to increase output, the removal of any form of restriction, always providing, and this is essential, that the remuneration of those engaged in industry is in no way impaired, but rather increased; in some solution of that nature we may have the germ of far greater prosperity, and even the solution of many of the problems which concern and dismay us at the present time.

Mr. BARNES: I beg to move, in line 2, to leave out from the first word "the" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof the words
immediate improvement of the industrial situation lies in the organisation of industry for the elimination of waste and the sound capitalisation of industry, and that increased production, though desirable, would aggravate the industrial situation and would not guarantee continuity of employment unless its distribution be equitable and is devoted to raising the standard of life of the people.
I move this Amendment because I do not consider that increased production of itself can solve any of our economic ills. We have had increased production ever since the capitalist system began. Year after year we have increased our output of commodities, and yet the fact remains that to-day life is more critical and anxious for millions of our citizens than it was before the capitalist system was inaugurated. A very legitimate point which we can submit to the Mover of the Resolution and the party that he represents is that if increased production of itself will solve our economic ills, why does not the Government put the one and a-quarter millions of unemployed to work immediately? We have only to consider a proposition of that description to realise that there is something more in the economic structure of society to-day than a pious expression such as this Resolution embodies.
While we on this side of the House do not disagree with the necessity for increased production, we would point out that the grievous anomaly that exists under capitalism is the fact that increased production instead of leading to increased consumption on the part of the mass of the people, aggravates in many respects the inequalities or life and the inequalities of opportunity. I want to examine this issue to-night not altogether from the situation we are in at the moment. The present state of affairs, economic, industrial, political and social, in Great Britain, is linked with our post-War policy. There are many factors in the world over which we have had no control which have affected the present situation. It is true that our foreign policy has aggravated many of these issues, to our disadvantage, but I do not think it is within my province to-night to examine the international field.
I want to devote my attention and my analysis to the home market and the home conditions of trade in which, to a large extent, we have been able to control our own destinies. The policy which financial and commercial interests in this country have operated since the war, hold out no inducement for the working classes to support them in the policy adumbrated in this Resolution. I would ask hon. Members to take their minds back to the position immediately after the Armistice. It was a buoyant time in trade; everybody was hopeful. Employers and all people engaged in trade in this country considered that there was an excellent opportunity for rapid industrial expansion. At the same time that these prospects were apparent to the commercial interests in this country, and when steps were taken after the war to lay the foundation of business expansion to meet this possible increase in trade, the Government, the Press, financial and business interests in this country, who organise opinion in certain directions, chose the opportunity to start a campaign for the purpose of economising consumption and exercising the utmost thrift, so far as saving was concerned, to provide the necessary capital for this expansion.
That was all right as far as it went. But there was no connection between that campaign and the financial policy of the banks, which, at that particular period was being prepared for a deflation policy. On the one hand you had a direction of all the public attention on the necessity of restriction of consumption, and on the other hand, at the same time we had a preparation and development of a policy leading to deflation. Directly deflation commenced to come into being, it involved a fall in prices. It was at that moment, directly prices commenced to fall that you had the full psyschological effect of the previous campaign to restrict consumption. Immediately prices began to fall, consumers stopped dead, with the exception of purchasing the absolute necessities that they required. With falling prices, traders had to unload their stocks at any cost. The unloading of stocks on the market at a time when the public generally were restrained and nervous in their purchases, compelled traders to sacrifice their stocks at unprecedented losses. With falling prices, with retarding stocks, so far as sales are
concerned, it meant that all traders, all selling agencies, at any rate, had to keep their stocks as short as possible. That meant that manufacturers could only produce for current requirements and for actual orders.
It was that position which, I claim, was deliberately produced, first, by the financial policy of the banking interests of this country, and, secondly, by the stupid lack of co-ordination between the Press publicity and Government control, which accentuated the slump that commenced in 1920 and has operated for a number of years. Falling prices, short stocks, the lowering of the output of Commodities, what was the result? Manufacturing costs commenced to rise very rapidly. Anyone who was in touch with business costs at that period knew that they were rising at a rate that was almost impossible to control. The people who produced this situation: where did they turn for relief? They turned for relief to the cutting of wages. To a certain extent you cannot help that, under the system, and that is why we condemn the system whereby human materials must always be sacrificed to the other materials like plant, machinery, buildings and things of that sort. You could not cut costs of that description; they were fixed and immovable. Therefore we had a policy which, in a space of three years, caused the workers of this country to suffer a net reduction of over £500,000,000 a year. I want to submit very briefly that it means that the workers in their wages, and in their standard of life, in unemployment, and in the lack of social improvement, as far as this generation is concerned, have been compelled by the present system to pay all the cost, the material and spiritual cost, which the waste of the War and the consequences of post-War policy have brought about in this country. In these circumstanes are not we entitled to say to the Members on the other side who represent the commercial and financial interests who have produced this situation: What guarantee have we that, if you have increased production in the near future, the workers will get adequate return with this experience in front of us? Who is going to determine that adequate return? Are the mineowners going to give an adequate return? Are we to take the policy of the Government on education as an indication of what their adequate
return represents in social policy? Therefore, we submit that the contention of Members on the other side, that increased production is a remedy for our social ills, is proved by facts and experience, and by the development of the consequences of our economic system, to be a fallacy, as far as our workers are concerned.
Since 1923 we have been more or less in a period of stabilised prices. We have got out of the slump, and, although we have not left the consequences of the economic policy behind us, we have been working on a more or less stabilised price basis, and during that period there has been an actual increase in production and output in this country in almost every trade. Working costs, as a result of the increased output of commodities and a clearing of stocks, have gone down. What is the result, in the last two or three years? In 1924, analysing 1,490 companies, the net profit of these companies totalled £142,000,000; in 1925 the profits of this same group of companies amounted to £154,000,000, an increase of over £12,000,000, which suggests that during that period there was, and from now onwards there will be, a rising output of commodities and a rising total quantity of wealth in the community. But during that year wages fell £70,000 a week. Wages fell, while profits had gone up to the extent of £12,000,000!
Let us take the analysis of the current rates of profits on ordinary capital for the last four years, which represents more or less a stabilised-price period. In 1922, the average return on ordinary capital was 8.4 per cent.; in 1923 it was 9.3 per cent.; in 1924, 9.8 per cent.; in 1925, 10.3 per cent. Where is the guarantee to the people that increased production means adequate return to the workers? There you see, without any question or doubt, that as far as we increase production and increase the total volume of wealth in this country, by the processes of control and distribution, and by its power, capital attracts that increase of wealth to itself and uses it in a different direction. Our arguments from these benches are these. We do not ignore economic problems or economic consequences, but we do say that the Government, the commercial and the financial interests of this country, have to realise
that in the twentieth century men and women of the working class can think for themselves and work these problems out for themselves.
Through our working-class organisations, like our trade union organisations, our co-operative societies, and other bodies of that description, they are, by experience, finding that they can organise and run industry, and, by relating production to consumption, secure the net results of industry, not for a comparatively small section of the community, but for the lifting up, however slightly, of the average condition of life of the majority. That is what you are faced with to-day. That is what capitalist interests must face to-day. The time has gone by when you can delude, hoodwink, and deceive the workers of this country by meaningless resolutions of this description. We shall proceed by our existing working-class institutions, and by the encroachment of political power, to organise more and more a process of production for the purposes of serving the needs and desires of the community.
Let me give the House another argument against the present system. We do not consider that the wealth that we create is being used adequately. We can point to a variety of ways in which there are produced commodities that are a sheer waste of human effort and of the wealth of the community. In our opinion there is no utility in producing commodities for the sake of producing them. Our contention is that the production of commodities should lead to increased human happiness and comfort. The post-War period of difficulty, which has helped Conservative Governments, social agitation, class embitterment and great industrial struggles, has meant the loss of wealth in this country. In the last six years the people of this country have produced commodities of a value of £2,774,000,000 for the payment of interest and principal on War Debt. Yet the debt is higher to-day. That wealth has been produced and the services rendered are represented in human labour. Where have they gone? They have gone to those people who own the National Debt. It is true that they have spent the money, but in what direction? In expenditure on luxurious articles, in the purchase of commodities which they do not require for their personal comfort and happiness, and
which mean the withdrawal of other services to the community.
Let me give a simple illustration to show what I mean. If you want increased production we can demonstrate how you can get it. It is well known that the costlier an article the less is the labour represented in the production of it. I have here an illustration of a fur coat, and similar illustrations can be seen in any newspaper. [An HON. MEMBER: "A Russian coat?"] Very likely it is a Russian coat, but it is of the sort that we do not buy. I notice that it is advertised for 128 guineas. As a matter of fact, you could produce 42 three-guinea coats for the same money. The 42 coats would provide more work; they would represent the greater output, if hon. Members opposite are so much concerned about increased output. The production of 42 useful three-guinea coats means greater output, more employment, and certainly it means more happiness and comfort for 42 women to have a three-guinea coat each than for one woman to have a coat costing 128 guineas.

Mr. HOPKINSON: Surely the hon. Member has forgotten that there is much more labour expended in shooting a blue fox, for example, than in shooting a cat.

Mr. BARNES: I notice that the hon. Member's economics, as far as this country is concerned, are quite wrong. The blue fox does not exist in this country, whereas rabbits or cats, whose furs may be used in these goods, will certainly be produced in this country. In our analysis of the present system we can detect the difficulty that is in the way. Hon. Members opposite agree as to the necessity for increased production. So do we. But they attach certain conditions. They will agree to increased production only if it means more profit. The Mover of the Resolution referred to housing. Why have we not more houses to-day? Private builders could build houses before the War because they made a profit on them. It is impossible to build a working-class house to-day and to let it at an economic rent that will bring in a profit. Therefore, although houses are more vitally necessary than ever for the health and comfort of the community, they are not produced. It does not matter to what field of industry you turn. Directly profit ceases private enterprise ceases to function.
We visualise a state of society that is not imaginary and not impracticable. We know that a machine can produce a piece of good cloth just as easily as it can produce shoddy cloth. We know that a boot operative can make a good solid boot just as easily as he can make a paper boot. We know that the building operative can build a good brick house if he likes, and he will do it if you will give him adequate wages. We can produce these commodities, but all the time capitalism, by taking the cream off the various processes which produce profit, eventually returns to the mass of the people a purchasing power out of all proportion to the total volume of goods that they produce. We intend by every constitutional means to develop through Parliament, through our local authorities, trade unions and co-operative organisations, the control and ownership of industry, of land, of capital and of raw materials, so that we can relate the purchasing power of the community to the total volume of goods produced. Then the increased production, the incentive to work and the question of restriction even on the part of employers and trade unionists, will fall to the ground, because the incentive in life to everyone who gives service is the sure knowledge that the results will not be taken from him, but that he will enjoy with others in the community what he has helped to produce.

Mr. D. GRENFELL: I beg to second the Amendment.
The hon. Member for Mossley (Mr. Hopkinson), who interrupted, in comparing the expense of shooting a blue fox and the expense of shooting a cat, apparently forgot that a cat has nine lives. I am satisfied that the Resolution we are discussing has been killed long ago. Time and time again the theory which it embodies has been put forward and has been demolished. We do not mind how often these targets are put up for us. They give us good shooting practice for bigger game. We shall show that this Resolution is quite an unjustifiable assertion on the part of hon. Members opposite. I had expected that the Mover would have explained more clearly what is desired. Does he want to increase production in the aggregate? Does he want more national production or does he want a higher individual production? Does he
want the individual man to work harder, and to expend more energy in order that he may produce a cheaper article and be paid at a lower rate? Hon. Members opposite have curiously avoided giving an explanation of their intentions in this Resolution. We have heard the old assertion with which we are so familiar that good trade follows higher production. Is that really the result? Have we forgotten the recent history of Germany, which was held up to us as an example. The German workmen have been referred to as the most industrious in Europe, as good-natured fellows who are willing to spend the last ounce of energy in the re-creation of their national life. The German worker, I believe, has been trying to obtain big production, and the German system has been organised on those lines, but what do we find? Germany is in a worse position to-day than she has been at any time since she became an industrial country. There are nearly 2,000,000 workers unemployed in this Utopia of high production, and willing workers.
The Mover of the Amendment has dealt exhaustively with the conditions at home which have produced a situation in which over 1,000,000 of our working people are idle. I propose to point to the position of our export trade because the Resolution refers to the hopes and possibilities of regaining what is said to be our lost export trade. We all know that the aggregate volume of trade is much less than it was in pre-War years. I think the figures of last year showed that we exported only 76 per cent. of the quantity which we exported in 1913. That is a drop of nearly 25 per cent. Is it due to anything that can be remedied by more application on the part of our working people? Is it not rather due to the failure of the world to receive our goods? Is it not due to the fact that we have been insisting on other nations sending material to us rather than receiving the materials which we can send to them? Reparations have contracted the avenue through which our foreign trade is conducted. We may assume that the channel through which our trade passes is limited to certain dimensions to-day, and what hon. Members opposite propose to do in that case is to dilute the flow of trade. They say, let us make more; let us pro-
duce more, and reduce prices, and alter the volume in that way. But that is not a way which will bring wealth to this country or add to the prosperity of industry. If we have commodities to sell, we must sell them at world prices, or we shall have to pay a disproportionate price for the goods which we receive in return. If by any magic wand or by any process which hon. Members opposite have in mind, but have not explained, we were able to produce in much bigger quantities, we would still have to sell our products at something corresponding to world prices.
The falling off in trade is marked in certain industries, such as the coal industry. The coal industry has hitherto been the chief means of creating export values in Great Britain. Since the War there has been a considerable falling off in that trade, but at the present time we find that while we do not sell within 20 per cent. of the quantities of coal abroad that we used to sell, we still sell a bigger share of the world's marketable coal than we have ever sold before. We own a bigger proportion of the world's trade in coal at the present time than we have ever owned; but if the world does not want coal any longer there is no use asking for more production. More production is possible in the collieries at the present time because we have 300,000 miners unemployed, and it would be possible to increase individual output. It is easy to produce more coal, but with what result? If you add to the production of the individual miner, you put out of work a corresponding percentage of men who are at present employed and thus add to our troubles, and you also add to the cost of production by increasing the rates as a result of that additional unemployment. I have figures from 13 industrial areas in South Wales where the rates are much in excess of 20s. in the £, and represent an average of 23s. in the £, or an increase of 140 per cent. above pre-War rates. That all adds to the cost of production, and if by the process which hon. Members have in mind you were enabled to employ less colliers, you would have more colliers on the local rates, more Poor Law expenses, and a higher cost of production. There is no remedy to be found in that way.
The way in which the remedy is to be found is indicated in the Amendment.
The Prime Minister, speaking at Plymouth in 1923, in his famous policy speech, said one of the points of his policy was to take steps to redress the balance in industry, and he referred to the one-sided development of our national industry by which men were taken from the countryside and thrown into congested industrial centres where they were unable to find employment. There lies the remedy. We cannot compel the world to buy from us. We cannot enable the world to buy from us by advancing them money. If this were a question of creating markets, I might be able to show that there is a country, naturally complementary in an economic sense, to this country, where we might be able to sell considerable quantities of goods. I refer to Russia. I am satisfied that with proper relations between this country and Russia, a great deal of our unemployment would be relieved by giving to Russia that which she requires, and which we can produce here, and by deriving from her natural products which we are unable to supply ourselves.
I shall not, however, follow that argument to-night. The line which I suggest to-night may be indicated by taking the coal industry as a direct example. Here is an industry producing a commodity which will not be required in the prewar quantities for a considerable time to come, if ever again. Here is an industry capable of producing large quantities of coal, but largely idle because nobody has need for the coal which we have to sell. We could give this coal away at a price 25 per cent. lower than the present price, but still the demand would not increase to any appreciable extent. What is the remedy? We find the coincidence that in a period of stagnation in the coal trade we ourselves are importing immense quantities of oil each year—of the oil which is contained in this coal and is a very valuable product of the coal. The proper organisation of the industry would make it possible for us, in the absence of markets, to mine the coal, to extract the oil from the coal at home, and to dispense with the necessity for importing oil in the large quantities in which we now import it.
It is on those lines that the coal industry could be resuscitated—the exercise of the capital of the nation, subject to proper direction, in making the best use of our industry and finding employment for our men in a way which would really
add to the nation's wealth. What is the use of suggesting that we should reduce the price of coal by another 2s. or 3s. per ton, and get this richest of all our national treasures bought at a price much below the price that gives a living wage for our people, when by proper organisation at home we can make this treasure yield its full value, and build up our industrial system and our economic life in a way that, without this organisation, we have never any hope of building it up again? We import in foodstuffs into this country between £400,000,000 and £500,000,000 worth each year, depending on the sale of our manufactured goods to pay for those products which we could very well produce at home. In this country, which has a soil comparable to that of any competing country, which has more convenience for transport in the form of railway systems, canals and rivers that are more accessible than any agricultural country in the world, we have the possibility of producing, if properly organised, more than half the £400,000,000 worth of foodstuffs which we now import. It is not by adding to the burden of the day worker, by paying him lower wages and working him longer hours, that we shall gain.
What is the view of hon. Members opposite of the situation next May? It is well known to all who have studied the mining situation that the miners are making no appeal for more wages. They say they are working as hard as they can to-day, that human physique cannot stand more, and that their homes are deprived of comforts because of the low wages they get, but they do not ask for any more. What do hon. Members who talk about higher wages and the need for paying adequate wages say about the situation next May? Will they say that the miners shall be paid adequate maintenance after May? Will they say it is good business to pay good wages in the mining industry, or will they, rather, lend themselves to the proposal that wages shall be cut again, thus lowering the aggregate of purchasing power and making the home market still smaller than it is at the present time? We want high production because we want high consumption, but we say that, prior to a recognition of high production, we must have a recognition of the right to high consumption all round. It is only when hon. Members opposite and those responsible for the
industrial life of this country recognise that all the people of this country have a right to the enjoyment, not of fur coats at 128 guineas, but of good food, good clothing, proper houses, and a higher standard of life all round—it is only then that the industries of this country will be able to produce, and find a ready demand for, the goods they can produce. In our Amendment we say that the
immediate improvement of the industrial situation lies in the organisation of industry for the elimination of waste and the sound capitalisation of industry, and that increased production, though desirable, would aggravate the industrial situation and would not guarantee continuity of employment unless its distribution be equitable and is devoted to raising the standard of life of the people.
I have every confidence that, whether this year or next year, hon. Members opposite and those who oppose our views in this country will agree that the prosperity of the country lies in the prosperity and the contentment of all the homes in the country.

10.0 P.M.

Mr. AUSTIN HOPKINSON: I should like, in the first instance, to congratulate The hon. Member for Gower (Mr. D. Grenfell), who has just sat down, on his very excellent quip at my expense—perhaps the best quip that I have ever heard from the benches on which he sits. I should like to congratulate him also on having spent a very happy half-hour, because I gathered that he was very happy in the argument he was putting before us. But it seems to me that there is very often a certain remoteness from the actual problems of industry displayed by those who speak from the benches above the Gangway. Indeed, there is that same remoteness sometimes displayed by hon. Members opposite, because on both sides, when a discussion of this sort arises, we find gentlemen who know all about it, who are quite convinced that the problem is a perfectly simple one, and that those poor unfortunate people who, like myself, are actively engaged in endeavouring to solve that problem are very stupid not to see what a very easy matter it is. What I think must have struck those who have listened to the Debate so far is that not only has there been a remoteness from the actual problems of industry as they arise from day to day, but that there has been a
remoteness from the consideration of the fact that in industry we are largely dealing with human beings and not with economic men, whether those economic men invented by individualists or those economic men invented by collectivists.
For example, I think it was the opener of this Debate, and certainly the Seconder of the Motion, who referred to the well-known fact that the production of the workers in America at present is gigantic as compared with the production of similar workers in this country, and they also referred to the equally well-known fact that the economic condition of the workers of America is again very much higher than the general economic condition of the workers in this country at the present time. But they failed to point out that that is not due to a matter of climate, nor even to the geographical conditions, but that it is due undoubtedly to a very great distinction between the actual personalities concerned in America and the personalities concerned in this country. It has been my misfortune to have been connected intimately with the coal industry of this country for the greater part of my life, and the problem which confronts us repeatedly in that industry is a problem which, I believe, does not exist in the United States of America.
I gather that in the coalfields of the United States the love of money among all classes, and particularly among the working miners themselves, is such that, if wages are high and trade is prosperous, the men would be only too willing to work Saturday afternoon and Sunday in order that they might add a second Ford car to the one they already possess. In other words, in America they have a very primitive form of civilisation, a civilisation which, I believe, this country passed through at about the time when the Liberal party—the old Liberal party—was the sole foundation of economic and political rectitude. In this country, and particularly among the mining population, we now have a well developed and an old civilisation, and fortunately the progress of civilisation has mitigated that overwhelming love of money which is so distinctive of primitive nations such as that of the United States.
When wages are high, as fortunately they are at times in the coal fields, and when on Thursday morning the simple
miner looks out of his bedroom window and sees that it is a fine day, he is only too apt in our country, where there is a real civilisation, to say to himself, "I put in a shift on Monday, I put in a shift on Tuesday and I put in a shift yesterday, and it is a fine day to-day. I shall have quite enough to draw for my expenses and I shall take the pup for a walk." That makes it difficulty to carry on the coal industry of this country. I have no doubt that there are many coalowners in this country at the present date who would delight to see this country retrace its steps and take that reactionary course which would bring them to the stage of evolution which is now occupied by the bulk of the population of the United States. If you could be certain that our workers were really fond of money, and that the more money they got the fonder of it they would become, as used to be the case I believe in this country, then the problems of industry would be solved very easily, almost as easily as hon. Members above the Gangway believe they could solve them if they were allowed to do the job.
Surely the real problem we have before us is how to persuade the workers in some of our industries to adjust the balance between wages and production. When the Mining Association of Great Britain put forward the suggestion that wages in the industry must be reduced they forgot to explain what they really meant. What they really meant was that they could not see any way out of the present difficulty except by an adjustment of the ratio between wages and production in the coal industry. That, of course, is the real crux of the problem. When the world is impoverished and the country has poured out capital like water over a period of years in a European war, it is absolutely necessary to make an adjustment if we are ever again to recover our position. In that connection I do not think we need take the somewhat pessimistic views of the Proposer and Seconder. Personally, as far as I can see, and I think I shall have the support of very much more important people than myself, we have turned the corner.
We have been through a period when every political and economic folly has been put into force in this country—I mean the period from 1906 to the present day. But, in spite of that, the strength of this nation is such and the common
sense of the workers of this nation is such that we have survived. I venture to say no other nation on earth could have survived those days which concluded with the downfall of the Coalition Government. For example, look what the productive workers of this country have got to carry. We have got to carry the building trade, lock, stock and barrel. We have got to carry the building trade merchants the plumber and the rest of them. Everybody in the building trade has got to be paid something out of our wages week by week. In the same way, we have got to carry the gentlemen represented so ably by the right hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Thomas), who, if I might say so, has shown extraordinary ability and of all men deserves well of those persons whose interests he represents. I think the trade union leader who, practically by his own unaided efforts and his own intelligence, has placed his men on the backs of everybody else is one to be envied. I think the ingratitude of some of those whom he placed in that fortunate position is very much to be deprecated.
We are carrying the building trade on our shoulders, we are carrying the transport workers [HON. MEMBERS: "Who is we?"] Myself and my engineers. We are carrying on our shoulders also various other petty industries which are added to our burdens occasionally. We are carrying the employés of the municipality and of the State, and although we are paying these inflated and artificial wages our difficulty does not end there. We are not only paying the men on the railways an artificial wage at our expense, but we are putting into the market every week the railwayman's wife to bid up the price of the necessities of life against us. I speak with some feeling in this matter as one of those unhappy persons that has to endeavour to provide a decent living for a number of excellent good fellows in the engineering trade, people who cannot be sheltered. It is a little rough when we find our efforts thwarted by the wives of the friends of the right hon. Member for Derby and the wives of the gentlemen engaged in the building trade and the wives of the gentlemen who drive trams and collect the fares and of those who sweep the streets and of a vast host of other gentlemen who are in the happy position of being paid by us an artificial
wage, which they use to produce an artificial price for the necessities of life.
That is the problem we have got to face. At present it is difficult to see how we are going to get out of it, because, unfortunately, those in the sheltered industries have got the whip hand of the rest of us. I must give them credit for this—particularly the railway men—that they have not used it to the extent they might have. They have let us down fairly easily considering the cards they hold, but they might ease off a little more. Really to sit on a loco in the siding, reading the "Daily Herald," having lunch over the greater part of the day, and beginning to draw those rates of overtime which loco men begin to draw now at a very early hour in the day, adds to the load on the productive industries a very heavy burden indeed.
To give an example of what we have to put up with in the engineering industry I have here figures from the City of Glasgow which were given in evidence before the Coal Commission. They are the figures of the wages paid to the employés of the Glasgow Corporation, refuse carriers—an extraordinary skilled trade—get 85s. a week; joiners get 80s. a week; bin emptiers 61s.; park labourers 55s.; park gardeners 57s.; destructor labourers 55s., road sweepers 50s., though for some obscure reason lavatory attendants only get 43s. 6d. In my own district the agreed district rate for a skilled fitter or turner is 56s. 6d. if he is lucky enough to get a job. That that man should, week by week, have to pay shillings out of his wages in order to keep men in the sheltered industries and the municipal and State employés in what to him is comparative luxury seems to me the greatest injustice. [HON. MEMBERS: "It is too low!"] Supposing we raise his wages, supposing the whole engineering industry raise their wages, it means that instead of 18 per cent. being on the books you are going to get 36 per cent. on the books. We are not a sheltered industry. It is easy enough to raise the wages of the sheltered industries, but we have got to pay them and the miner has got to pay them.
It is the price that we can get that fixes our wages in the unsheltered trades. In other words, we are only paid by the
services we render to the community, and we cannot levy blackmail on the community as some in this country can. Therefore, we have to suffer, and I do hope, at any rate, some of our friends above the Gangway will really take into consideration the extreme importance of this question. We have a burden we cannot bear. It is almost unbelievable that the most skilled of our men, the men upon whose work depends the reputation of this country in the markets of the world, should be living on a wage less than that of unskilled labour. And it is not only an utter injustice, but a piece of the greatest unwisdom. Reference was made by the Seconder to methods to induce men to give the extra bit of production which, in our heart of hearts, we know is really wanted at the present time. One of the first things we have to do is to remove from the productive workers this appalling sense of injustice. They keep quiet for the good of their fellow workers in other industries, but they do feel—and I say this with knowledge—that they are not having a fair deal from some of the others.
I do not think we can solve the problem by some system of profit-sharing or copartnership. Experience over a long period has shown that is a very difficult thing to work, and only a comparatively few schemes have survived in recent years. There has been a very remarkable example of a general system of profit-sharing in a particular industry, and I think all of us, on whatever side we sit in this House, will agree that that experiment has not been a success, mainly for the reasons I have previously put before the House. It was not a success because it was imposed upon an industry which in the main was unwilling, by an outside authority, and because it limited the possibilities of fresh capital for development work. In order to give the miner a reasonable standard of living, the owners' profits were limited to such a drastic degree that they had not enough to spend year by year on development work. I may say, from my own experience of six years of profit-sharing in my own works, that that is the real difficulty of the whole system. The limitation of profits means the limitation of fresh capital, and that means the limitation of the possibility of a rapid raising of the standard of life of the people employed in that industry.
That being the case, it is only when profit-sharing is done voluntarily, and only, I might almost say, when done from proper motives on the part of the employer, that it has any possible chance of success. If an employer introduces a system of profit-sharing, as I think I can say, without boasting, I have myself, simply because he wants to give the best possible time to some of the best possible fellows in the world, then it does work, because in hard times the employer can find some little economy he can make himself in order to find fresh capital. Then, of course, production reaches what I believe to be a very high pitch indeed. That is to say, that under such conditions it is possible to compete in the markets of the world even against German competition, and at the same time pay what in these days is a fairly satisfactory wage. But I would warn the House against being misled as to the possibilities of co-partnership schemes, because it is utterly wrong to induce the small capitalist to put his savings into the business in which he is engaged and is earning a living. His position is precarious enough in all conscience, without adding to the risk.
In my own case if I make a mistake—and I am quite capable of making the most appalling mistakes—every one of my good friends may lose his job in the course of the next few weeks. If at the same time, through the system suggested, he is going to lose the little capital and the little savings he has, I say it is a most disastrous thing, and no employer of labour ought to take upon himself that responsibility. In these days the responsibility of keeping his men in full work in productive industries, in unsheltered industries, and giving them anything like a decent wage is responsibility enough without adding to that the further responsibility of taking up a position where he is the only person that stands between them and practical destitution in case of misfortune. Willing as I am, and as many employers are, to take responsibility in the first case, the second is asking them perhaps a little more than they can bear.

Mr. T. SHAW: I would very much like to enter into argument with the last speaker, but, unfortunately, the time at my disposal will not allow me to do so. I have risen to take part in the Debate because the Mover and Seconder of the
Resolution, while disclaiming any idea of so doing has committed the very error which has made it almost impossible for really good relationships to exist in this country between capital and labour. The speech of the Mover from beginning to end was preaching down to the workers. There was not a word to the employers. There was not a word of sympathy with the workers' sufferings. The whole speech from beginning to end was a lesson given to the workers.
Let me take the Resolution itself. What is the use of me going to Lancashire—as a Lancashire man who knows the textile trade—and telling people who are employed on short time—with millions of capital lying idle—the workers' skill unused — they are the most skilled workers in the world—and they cannot get rid of the production they have made—what, I say, is the use of me attempting to prove the impossible to them? What they want is a system of distribution first, and a system of production afterwards. The fact of the matter is that this country possesses infinite capacity for producing wealth, and the system of distribution is so bad that, in spite of it all, millions of our people are poor. That is the problem the House will have to solve if it ever is going to make a success of its efforts in this direction. We are told about the great virtues of the American working man. We are told that the American working man produces everything he can, that his means of production are extraordinary. There is never a word about the employer; never a word about the time the American employer puts into his work, never a word about American science! It is the worker, worker, worker all the time!
It is not true that the American miner works any harder than the British miner. It is questionable whether there is a man in the world who works harder than the British miner of to-day. He is the most generous, the bravest and the hardest working of all our industrial workers. It is about time people realised what mining is, and what it means. To take a little practice at it would do a world of good to some of the miners' critics. When one reads the papers, and hears criticisms from other quarters, one would think the miners were a decadent community. On the contrary, the miners, who are being attacked, are skilful. But
are the mines skilfully managed? We have had one or two inquiries into mining, and the results of those inquiries have not shown that too much skill is invested in the management of the mines; and the latest demand of the mine-owners, that British miners should work for less money, or should work longer hours, even than miners on the Continent, is a positive insult to the intelligence, not only of the miners of this country, but of the world.
Then we are told that it is the miners who are going to attack the country, and the rest of the workers are standing behind the miners. The view of the country is being twisted. The position of the miners is misrepresented, as the position of other workers is misrepresented. After several savage cuts in wages, wireless operators refused to submit to another cut. They did not ask for an advance of wages. When they sent their case to Members of Parliament, one well-known Member of this House wrote telling them they were literally criminals, that they had made demands upon their employers which the latter were not prepared to grant, when all the time he knew that the demands were not made by the men at all, but that it was the employers who were demanding a reduction in wages. What is the use of preaching to working men about a better understanding when on every occasion they see their case misrepresented publicly and themselves blamed, even when they are defending themselves against attack? It is no use talking about good feeling until we begin to realise what good feeling is.
Then we are told that we ought not let political vanity blind us to the facts of the situation If I wanted to talk about political vanity I could talk about the political vanity of hon. and right hon. Members on the other side of the House, who, feeling themselves, apparently, to be little tin Napoleons, are prepared to put themselves at the head of a great army in order to do the work if the miners leave it. Well, I welcome all the work they will do—down the pits. I can see the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary leading his great army down the pits and showing the miners how to work—I can see it in my dreams, but I shall never see it in reality. We shall
hear a lot of talk about mining, but we shall not see many men attempting to do the miners' work. The sooner we get rid of political vanity the better, and if Ministers would set an example and get some work done in their Departments instead of continually preaching to the workers we should, perhaps, have a better country than we have now.
I want to say one or two words about why the thinking worker refuses to accept these resolutions at their face value. He sees, what every social student has seen for years, that, whilst everything has been done to improve machines; whilst machines have been made uncanny in their operations; whilst by ballbearings, lubrication systems and other applications of science we have made the machine almost a sentient being, working with the minimum of friction, we are only just beginning to study the human body. We are only just beginning to study how human beings can work with the minimum of friction, how they can produce the best results with the minimum of exertion; how to apply science to the work done by man so that his production will be increased without so much fatigue. The working man knows all about it. He knows that so long as human blood and muscle and bone and sinew were cheap he could work and he could die. It costs capital to replace machinery, but no capital is required to replace a worker. The worker is now determined that he must be treated as a human being, not as a machine, and his human aspirations must be attended to. Therefore, I hope we shall hear very little more of the continued one-sided statements about the worker not using his talent.
If someone got up and pointed out what was considered to be lacking on both sides, in regard to science and skill on the capital side and the supposed abuse of productive power on the part of the worker, then we could listen to the arguments with some respect, but in the speech of the Mover and Seconder of this Motion there was no criticism at all of the employers. It is no use preaching to one side and leaving the failings of the other side altogether out of consideration, and it will not work. If we are going to face this question of production and distribution scientifically, we must open both eyes and not one eye, and look
at the faults of both sides at the same time. We hear talk of men having the right to demand decent wages, and that appears in the Resolution, but there is no indication as to how these decent wages are to be paid.
We are told that if we get efficeincy, decent wages will follow, but even that is not true. I believe that the absolute maximum of production ought to be got in every industry. I do not believe that the greatest production is to be got by hard physical work, low wages or long hours, because every indication proves that short hours, the application of science and the elimination of fatigue lead to a higher production, and that is what does not appear to be realised by employers generally. The idea of increasing production by lowering wages and increasing wages is 50 years behind the times. If we had a few Henry Fords studying how to make industry efficient—

Mr. J. JONES: I hope to God we never shall!

Mr. SHAW: I know the point of view of the hon. Member for Silvertown, but I am putting my own point of view.

Mr. JONES: You are speaking for the party, and not for yourself.

Mr. SHAW: I am speaking my own ideas, as I always intend to speak them, and I shall put them forward in the same way every time. The theory that long hours, low wages, and hard work mean high production is not true, and if only employers would realise that, there would be an understanding of a better type as to what ought to be done in industry. The old practice of using a workman as an animal, as a beast of burden, is, or ought to be, dead, and we ought to devote our efforts to studying how in the best possible way we can get the best possible results with the minimum of physical effort. It is no use talking to us, either, about control leading to great waste and great expenditure. As a matter of fact, the Mover of the Resolution called attention to the fact that phenomenal production was achieved just at the time when nearly every industry in the country was controlled. If it be true—and I hold that it is true—that when we had a scientific control of industry the production went up enormously, then it is true to-day.
I do not believe it is true, either, that the country is poor. This country is really rich in its capacity beyond the dreams of avarice. We have scores of millions of capital lying idle, and we have well over a million skilled workers also idle. We have wealth to be produced, and workers to produce it, and we are rich enough to waste the efforts of both the capital and the men. If we were not rich we could not bear it; we are bearing it because we are stupid, not because we are not rich. The intention of the Amendment is to see that at the present time we get increased production and a scientific method of distribution, so that those who produce may have the fruits of their labour. That is why I shall go gladly into the Lobby for the Amendment. I hope that this discussion will finally lead to an attempt to see this problem in its true light, that it will lead to a better feeling for the workers, that it will lead to a clearer statement of the position, that it will lead to giving the workers fairer play, that it will lead to an understanding that they, and they alone, ought to come first to the national table when the food is put upon it; for the worker with hand and brain in productive industry is the one man above all who ought to be looked after first in this country and have the fruits of his labour.

The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Sir Philip Cunliffe-Lister): I only want to intervene for a very few moments. Having heard the whole of this Debate, I think that, whatever views may be taken of the merits of this Motion the House will be grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Chislehurst for initiating this debate. There are two reasons why any Member of the House might without injury to his conscience or his political convictions, support the general object of the Motion. I do not think it is really challenged that effective maximum production is not only desirable but necessary in industry under whatever system we are living. It has been said by the right hon. Gentleman who spoke last that it is not fair to say that that depends entirely upon the worker, and I should be the first to agree with that statement, though I think the right hon. Gentleman was a little unfair to my hon. Friend who moved the Resolution. I do not think there was really anything in my hon. Friend's speech
which was as wholly one-sided as the right hon. Gentleman has suggested. But, if you are to have efficient maximum production, that undoubtedly means that you must have the best equipment and management in a factory that you can get.
It means that employers have to work at least as hard as, and probably a good deal harder than their workmen; it means the best brains and the best scientific application, and so on. That is necessary if you are to get the best output, and if the workman is to be in a position to give the best output. That is true. But, on the other side, where you will find the security and the encouragement which will produce at once the capital and the incentive to get that equipment? You will never find it unless, on the side of the workman, you get the best that the worker can put into his work. Therefore, both aspects of this truth are right; you have to get the greatest efficiency on both sides, and in order to get that efficiency you have to have the consideration moving from both sides, as the lawyers say, in the contract, and you have therefore really to have a partnership in endeavour. That is the first reason why I should say this Motion should be supported.
The second—and here I disagree with the hon. Member who seconded the Amendment—is that it is untrue to suggest that greater production is not going to lead to greater consumption. Nothing is more fallacious than to argue that there is only a limited market in the world and that that market cannot be increased. As a matter of fact, greater efficiency in output in this country—capacity to sell at low prices—not only means that you get a bigger share in the static markets of the world. It means that as prices come down, you increase almost proportionately the potential consumption that there is. I think the hon. Member who seconded the Amendment will agree that that is true of the coal trade.

Mr. D. GRENFELL: The price of coal was reduced 4s. in 1925 as compared with 1924 and less coal was sold.

Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: The hon. Member is well aware of the conditions that were obtaining in 1924 as compared
with the conditions that are obtaining now, and if he will go through some interesting figures which have been given to me of sales in the Scottish Co-operative Society, they show that as the price of coal fell, so consumption increased—not in the full ratio, but it has undoubtedly increased. [An HON. MEMBER: "Domestic coal!"] Certainly domestic, but it is also true of industrial supplies of coal. As prices come down so you produce cheaper and sell more. Everyone will admit that in that trade the increase that has lately taken place in export is not only due to the fact that you are capturing a bigger share of the static export market but you are actually developing an increasing demand for coal, and if that is true of coal it is true of all things. I get reports from abroad which go to show that, British prices having come dawn, British quality is more appreciated, and again you are not only getting a bigger share of the static market, but you are getting a developing market. For both those reasons I would commend the Motion to the House. Whatever be the basis of our economic and social system, whether it is individualistic or socialistic, this is going to remain true, that this country has to import far more than it can ever export, that it has got to pay for what it imports, its food and its raw material, by its sales and its services. But whatever the social system, it has got to be able to produce at a price at which it can sell in the markets of the world, and that can only be achieved by the most efficient production.

Mr. MacLAREN: In the last sentence of his speech the right hon. Gentleman said that greater production necessarily means greater prosperity and comfort amongst the workers. It has been shown by the previous speakers on this side that that is not so. He used an illustration in regard to coal, discounting all the time the influence of the subsidy. If we go on subsidising various industries, undoubtedly we shall give an impetus to trade which will be largely transitory and will disappear when the subsidy disappears. I should like to deal with the speech of the Mover of the Resolution, which was devoted largely to a soft impeachment of the trade union leaders of this country. We were told that wages were low because of the lack of enthusiasm on the part of the workers to pro-
duce more, and that if their enthusiasm was intensified, if the trade union leaders were ignored and the heresies which they are preaching failed to permeate the discontented masses of the people, the wages of the workers would rise. Let us take the facts of the economic situation. Until this question is faced from the economic point of view, and dealt with on the economic plane, very little advance will be made.
The wages of the worker to-day, whether he happens to be a, labourer or a tradesman in any capacity, are determined by what the unemployed man is willing to take for doing the job that the man in employment now occupies. Except in one or two instances that is the ruling law. If you have a number of unemployed men in society, it does not matter how much you intensify production, because given this competition of the unemployed man looking for work, the unemployed man will set the pace for the wages paid. You may intensify production by machinery, by all forms of invention, as you have done during the past two centuries, and what has been the net result? It has not been that the workers have received increased wages. It has not been that the general comfort of the people has been such that the worker of to-day feels more relieved from the fear of poverty than his forefathers did 100 years ago. The working man to-day, although he may receive relatively higher monetary wages than his forefathers did 100 years ago, has a dread of poverty greater than was the dread of poverty 100 years ago. Intensified production has not meant much for the worker.
Something has been said about sheltered trades, and how the sheltered trades are in a privileged position whereby they can exact certain wages from the community. There may be something to be said about that; but can any hon. Member who complains about any section of the community getting behind whatever shelter they may seize upon ignore what has been the ruling passion for the last 60 years in industry? The employing classes the moment they are faced with intensified competition, instead of devising some scheme and coming to this House and using whatever brains and ability they have to lower their overhead charges, which now are and has been
for a long time a heavy handicap in the competitive field as far as the prices of exchangeable commodities are concerned, have invariably attacked wages. They have invariably said, "We cannot meet foreign competition, and therefore we must reduce wages."
It has always been the wages that have been open to the attack of the employing classes in this country. What happened the other day in this House? We had to listen to speech after speech on the mining question. We have been told that wages must come down; that wages are an enormous charge. I would like to emphasise this simple fact, that every time one listens to a Debate it becomes depressing to hear men in 1926, with cheap literature on economics within their grasp, at small prices, saying that wages are a charge against production. Is there a sane man in this House who dares to advance the theory that the employing class advance the wages to the workers before the workers render to them a service? Wages have to be paid, but the wages are not paid to the worker until the worker has paid over to the employer more than he receives in wages. Yet you hear, underlying all these Debates and discussions, this economic fallacy, which would disgrace a fourth form boy who has made a study of economics, that wages are a surcharge against production. If you want enthusiasm in your workers, the best thing that any employer can do is to give them the fullest possible remuneration and to reduce overhead charges in other directions. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] I am glad that I received that response, extremely glad. Hon. Members say, "Hear, hear, let us reduce overhead charges in other directions!" Let me take two of them: Your national taxation and your local rates. These are two overhead charges. I will only mention these; I could mention others, but in order to keep clear of contentious ground I will mention these two only. The Minister said nothing about them in his reply.

Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: One cannot tell the whole of the truth in ten minutes.

Mr. MacLAREN: I quite admit, of course, in that short space of time the Minister could not. But I should have thought that, being a Front Bench man,
and replying to this Debate, this most important point of the rate of taxation and the burden on industry would at least have occurred to his mind. I will take these things, and I will ask the employing class who are in this House amongst The hon. Members opposite, if they would be prepared to support those of us on this side of the House who would take immediate action to remove certain rates and taxes off industry, and put them on another place. Will you? No. [HON. MEMBERS: "You have not said what!"] I am asked, put them on what? I will tell you on another occasion. [HON. MEMBERS: "Ah! Tell us!"] I hope this joviality will not distract our minds from the fact that this is a serious discussion. I am asked where would I put these rates and taxes. I am merely asking hon. Gentlemen opposite, if an occasion arose when we would appeal to them to remove these rates and taxes, which are now a heavy impediment, would they support us?
I have two suggestions. There are now two bases upon which you can levy rates and taxes of any kind. The first is upon the value of the products of human labour—and when you do so you increase the cost of production and give rise to unemployment. If, on the other hand, you levy your taxation upon monopoly values inherent in special franchises, and upon the value of the soil of this country—[HON. MEMBERS "Ah!"]I knew that that would create a smile, but I want to tell hon. and right hon. Members that it will not be months until you will not smile, when it comes into this House as a serious proposition, because the rating and taxation in this country are driving us on to bankruptcy. You have either got to face this issue seriously or go on the road you are now on.
I am not going to be diverted from what I have in my mind. When Debate after Debate takes place in this House and appeals are made to the gentlemen opposite to take certain lines of action to remove certain brakes which are now upon industry, you walk complacently into that Lobby as if nothing had happened. The other day the Minister of Health, in language that was eloquent and persuasive, and which for clarity of thought stands unequalled amongst the
classics of this House, advocated the unrating of machinery, and the argument was that by that he would give an impetus to industry that would almost absorb the unemployed. Hon. Members opposite all cheered him for the statement. They did not then ask the Minister on what he proposed to put the rates that he was taking off machinery, despite the fact that some of them thought that these rates would have to be levied on the houses of the poorer people. The factors in production are labour applied to land, and capital.
We have observed a fact that hon. Members opposite have forgotten. The net result of progress and invention, the intensified production of commodities has led to this and nothing else: wages have always been beaten down by the presence of unemployed men. Wages, if they have risen at all, have risen more or less artificially. Any attempt to raise them artificially has soon been checkmated by the action of the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the other side Capital as had to struggle very often for an existence, until it received a secure position under some special protection. But there is another section in society who own and control the land of the country. We are selling land in London to-day at thousands of pounds per acre—land which has gone up in value from prairie value. The value of laud has increased, but wages have remained static. And here we are to-day, by virtue of this land monopoly creating unemployment, and this unemployment keeping wages in a static condition. Yet you are coming into this House and asking us to produce more, and stating that the workers will get more wages, while there stands in front of you the competitive men who will keep wages static under any conditions.

Mr. J. JONES: I have just two minutes. In so far as we are concerned, we repudiate all these half-way houses to what we want. The landlord is not the only robber. He is only a sleeping partner in this concern. As far as increased production is concerned, some of us would like to see those who talk so much about it going down the mines and working in the mills and factories and doing a bit themselves. No, they know a better game than that. They will be directors of companies, some of them
directors of 13 companies at one and the same time. One of them admitted to the Coal Commission that there were 14 companies which he directed. God help us! Where did his brains come from? He gets £1,000 a year for each £14,000 a year for looking after 14 companies—and he knows less about them than the lowest man who works there. [HON. MEMBERS: "You will talk it out!"] I will not talk it out; I am talking it in.

Mr. BARNES: rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Mr. SPEAKER: I think the House is prepared to come to a decision.

Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

The House divided: Ayes,124; Noes, 115.

Division No.13.]
AYES
[11.00 p.m.


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Gretton, Colonel John
Peto, Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)


Agg-Gardner, Rt. Hon. Sir. James T.
Grotrian, H. Brent
Phillpson, Mabel


Allen, J. Sandeman (Lipool, W. Derby)
Gunston, Captain D. W.
Price, Major C. W. M.


Amery, Rt. hon. Leopold C. M. S.
Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry
Radford, E. A.


Apsley, Lord
Harland, A.
Ramsden, E.


Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Harrison, G. J. C.
Rawson, Sir Alfred Cooper


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Harvey, G. (Lambeth, Kennington)
Remer, J. R.


Barnston, Major Sir Harry
Harvey, Major S. E. (Devon, Totnes)
Richardson, Sir P. W. (Sur'y, Ch'ts'y)


Betterton, Henry B.
Headlam, Lieut.-Colonel C. M.
Ropner, Major L.


Bourne, Captain Robert Croft
Henn, Sir Sydney H.
Ruggles-Brise, Major E. A.


Bowyer, Capt. G. E. W.
Hennessy, Major J. R. G.
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)


Briscoe, Richard George
Hills, Major John Walter
Rye, F. G.


Brittain, Sir Harry
Holbrook, Sir Arthur Richard
Samuel, A. M. (Surrey, Farnham)


Brooke, Brigadier-General C. R. I.
Holt, Capt. H. P.
Sandeman, A. Stewart


Brown-Lindsay, Major H.
Hope, Capt. A. O. J. (Warw'k, Nun.)
Sassoon, Sir Philip Albert Gustave D.


Bullock, Captain M.
Hopkinson, A. (Lancaster, Mossley)
Shaw, R. G. (Yorks, W. R., Sowerby)


Burman, J. B.
Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)
Smith, R. W. (Aberdin & Kinc'dine, C.)


Burton, Colonel H. W.
Iliffe, Sir Edward M.
Stanley, Col. hon. G. F. (Will'sden, E.)


Cecil, Rt. hon. Sir. Evelyn (Aston)
Jephcott, A. R.
Stanley, Lord (Fylde)


Chadwick, Sir Robert Burton
Kidd, J. (Linlithgow)
Stanley, hon. O. F. G. (Westm'eland)


Cockerill, Brigadier-General G. K.
Kindersley, Major Guy M.
Steel, Major Samuel Strang


Cope, Major William
King, Captain Henry Douglas
Stott, Lieut.-Colonel W. H.


Crawford, H. E.
Lister, Cunliffe-, Rt. Hon. Sir. Philip
Sugden, Sir Wilfrid


Crooke, J. Smedley (Deritend)
Little, Dr. E. Graham
Thom, Lt.-Col. J. G. (Dumbarton)


Crookeshank, Col. C. de W. (Berwick)
Locker-Lampson, Coin. O. (Handsw'th)
Thompson, Luke (Sunderland)


Crookshank, Cpt. H. (Lindsey, Cainsbro)
Looker, Herbert William
Thomson, F. C. (Aberdeen, S.)


Cunliffe, Sir Joseph Herbert
Lougher, L.
Wallace, Captain D. E.


Curzon, Captain Viscount
Lumley, L. R.
Warner, Brigadier-General W. W.


Dalkeith, Earl of
Macdonald, Capt. P. D. (I. of W.)
Wells, S. R.


Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)
McDonnell, Colonel hon. Angus
Williams, Com. C. (Devon, Torquay)


Dean, Arthur Wellesley
McLean, Major A.
Williams, Herbert G. (Reading)


Dixey, A. C.
Macmillan, Captain H.
Wilson, R. R. (Stafford, Lichfield)


Edmondson, Major A. J.
Macquisten, F. A.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Erskine, Lord (Somerset, Weston-s.-M.)
Margesson, Captain D.
Wise, Sir Fredric


Fielden, E. B.
Merriman, F. B.
Wornersley, W. J.


Finburgh, S.
Meyer, Sir Frank
Wood, B. C. (Somerset. Bridgwater)


Fremantle, Lieut.-Colonel Francis E.
Milne, J. S. Wardlaw-
Woodcock, Colonel H. C.


Ladle, Lieut.-Col. Anthony
Mitchell, S. (Lanark, Lanark)
Wragg, Herbert


Gates, Percy
Nall, Lieut.-Colonel Sir Joseph



Gault, Lieut.-Col. Andrew Hamilton
Neville, R. J.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Gibbs, Col. Rt. Hon. George Abraham
Oakley, T.
Mr. Smithers and Brigadier.


Glyn, Major R. G. C.
Pennefather, Sir John
General Charteris.


Greene, W. P. Crawford
Perkins, Colonel E. K.



NOES


Adamson, Rt. Hon. W. (Fife, West)
Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)
Henderson, Right hon. A. (Burnley)


Alexander, A. V. (Sheffield, Hillsbro')
Davison, J. E. (Smethwick)
Henderson, T. (Glasgow)


Ammon, Charles George
Dennison, R.
Hirst, G. H.


Attlee, Clement Richard
Duncan, C.
Hirst, W. (Bradford, South)


Baker, Walter
Gibbins, Joseph
Jenkins, W. (Glamorgan, Neath)


Barr, J.
Gosling, Harry
Johnston, Thomas (Dundee)


Batey, Joseph
Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)


Beckett, John (Gateshead)
Graham, At. Hon. Wm. (Edin., Cent.)
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)


Bowerman, Rt. Hon. Charles W.
Greenwood, A. (Nelson and Colne)
Jones, T. I. Mardy (Pontypridd)


Broad, F. A.
Grenfell, D. R. (Glamorgan)
Kelly, W. T.


Bromfield, William
Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Kennedy, T.


Brown, James (Ayr and Bute)
Grundy, T. W.
Kirkwood, D.


Buchanan, G.
Guest, J. (York, Hemsworth)
Lansbury, George


Buxton, Rt. Hon. Noel
Hall, F. (York, W. R., Normanton)
Lawson, John James


Cape, Thomas
Hall, G. H. (Merthyr Tydvil)
Lee, F.


Charleton, H. C.
Hardie, George D.
Lowth, T.


Clowes, S.
Hastings, Sir Patrick
Lunn, William


Compton, Joseph
Hayday, Arthur
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. J. R. (Aberavon)


Connolly, M.
Hayes, John Henry
Mackinder, W.


MacLaren, Andrew
Sexton, James
Townend, A. E.


Maclean, Neil (Glasgow, Govan)
Shaw, Rt. Hon. Thomas (Preston)
Varley, Frank B.


MacNeill-Weir, L.
Shiels, Dr. Drummond
Viant, S. P.


March, S.
Short, Alfred (Wednesbury)
Wallhead, Richard C.


Maxton, James
Sitch, Charles, H.
Walsh, Rt. Hon. Stephen


Mitchell, E. Rosslyn (Paisley)
Stesser, Sir Henry H.
Warne, G. H.


Montague, Frederick
Smillie, Robert
Watson, W. M. (Dunfermline)


Naylor, T. E.
Smith, Ben (Bermondsey, Rotherhithe)
Welsh, J. C.


Oliver, George Harold
Smith, Rennie (Penistone)
Westwood, J.


Palin, John Henry
Snell, Harry
Williams, David (Swansea, East)


Paling, W.
Snowden, Rt. Hon. Philip
Williams, Dr. J. H. (Llanelly)


Parkinson, John Allen (Wigan)
Spencer, George A. (Broxtowe)
Williams, T. (York, Don Valley)


Potts, John S.
Stamford, T. W.
Wilson, C. H. (Sheffield, Attercliffe)


Richardson, R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Stephen, Campbell
Wilson, R. J. (Jarrow)


Ritson, J.
Stewart, J. (St. Rollox)
Windsor, Walter


Robinson, W. C. (Yorks, W. R., Elland)
Sutton, J. E.
Wright, W.


Rose, Frank H.
Taylor, R. A.
Young, Robert (Lancaster, Newton)


Saklatvala, Shapurji
Thomas, Rt. Hon. James H. (Derby)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Scrymgeour, E.
Thurtie, E.
Mr. A. Barnes and Mr. Charles


Scurr, John
Tinker, John Joseph
Edwards.


Question put, and agreed to.

Main Question again proposed.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

It being after Eleven of the Clock, the Debate stood adjourned.

Orders of the Day — SUPPLY.

Again considered in Committee.

[Mr. JAMES HOPE in the Chair.]

CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPARTMENTS SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1925–26.

CLASS I.

HOUSING SCHEMES.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1926, for Expenditure in respect of Housing Schemes under the Management of the Office of Works.

It being after Eleven of the Clock, and objection being taken to further Proceeding, the Chairman left the Chair to make his Report to the House.

Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.

Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.

Orders of the Day — HOUSE OF COMMONS (KITCHEN AND REFRESHMENT ROOMS).

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Select Committee be appointed to control the arrangements for the Kitchen and Refreshment Rooms in the department of the Serjeant-at-Arms attending this House."—[Colopel Gibbs.]

Mr. J. JONES: May I ask when some persons who cannot afford to pay a great deal for what they want can have the opportunity of sitting on that Committee? I mean what I say. We want a reasonable opportunity for refreshment, even in the House as well as outside. Is there some possibility of somebody being appointed on that Committee who knows what a working man wants?

Mr. SPEAKER: It is after Eleven o'clock, and if objection be taken to further proceedings, the Motion cannot be taken to-night.

Mr. BUCHANAN: Some of us do not oppose the appointment of this Committee, but we would like to raise one or two things about the Kitchen Committee, and the only chance we can see is on this appointment. Can you give us any guidance as to how we may raise these points.

Mr. SPEAKER: It certainly would not be in order on the appointment of the Committee to discuss matters connected with the proceedings of the Committee. There is a good opportunity now for Members putting down their names in the Ballot.

Mr. BUCHANAN: Surely we can discuss the Chairman's appointment, for instance, on the fact that his work during the past year was not satisfactory. That surely would be in order.

Mr. BATEY: Might I ask a question? If we had a word of discussion on the appointment, I wanted to discuss the menu in the kitchen. One night it is ox-tail; another night it is calves-head. There are only those two things.

Mr. J. JONES: What about jellied eels?

Mr. SPEAKER: I do not see any calves-head or ox-tail mentioned in the Motion. Is the House not willing to take a Vote? [HON. MEMBERS "Agreed!"]

Mr. J. JONES: In view of the fact that one of the Members from Scotland has been allowed to introduce a special dish, could not those of us who come from Ireland introduce pig's head and cabbage?

Ordered, That the Committee do consist of seventeen Members.

Sir James Agg-Gardner, Mr. Compton, Sir Walter de Frece, Sir Nicholas Grattan-Doyle, Mr. Dunnico, Sir Park Goff, Mr. George Harvey, Major Hennessy, Lieut.-General Sir Aylmer Hunter-Weston, Major-General Sir Robert Hutchison, Mr. Kirkwood, Mr. Macpherson, Mr. Murchison,
Sir Herbert Nield, Mrs. Philipson, Lieut.-Colonel Lambert Ward, and Miss Wilkinson nominated Members of the Committee.

Ordered, That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records:

Ordered, That Three be the quorum.—[Colonel Gibbs.]

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

ADJOURNMENT.

Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Colonel Gibbs.]

Adjourned accordingly at Fourteen Minutes after Eleven o'Clock.